


Metaphysical

by cjmarlowe



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe, Ensemble Cast, Gen, Historical, Original Characters - Freeform, Steampunk
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-06-16
Updated: 2009-06-16
Packaged: 2017-10-19 19:22:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 78,083
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/204364
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cjmarlowe/pseuds/cjmarlowe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In an alternate version of 1905 America, Sam and Dean hunt their way across a landscape of spirits and airships, demons and automata, in pursuit of their father and the demon who destroyed their family. (A steampunk reimagining of Supernatural season one, with stolen elements and characters from seasons 2-4.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Metaphysical

**Author's Note:**

> Written for spn_j2_bigbang 2009, which means it has some fabulous art to go with it. Go [here](http://tammylee.livejournal.com/1312982.html) for the art master post. (And, if you're feeling it, [here](http://cjmarlowe.livejournal.com/462402.html) for the soundtrack.)

**TWENTY-TWO YEARS AGO**

_Lawrence, Kansas, 1883_

Ever since the arrival of baby Samuel, Mary's elder son had proven increasingly difficult to keep in bed. Tonight alone she'd had to fetch Dean back to his room thrice, this latest time from the floor next to Sam's crib where he was showing his infant brother his favorite tin automata.

"Sammy's not old enough to play yet," she told him, scooping him up off the floor and hefting him in her arms. "Back to bed with you."

Dean squirmed in her arms until she let him place one of the tiny soldiers, already wound up and raising his pistol arm up and down, up and down, in Sam's crib next to him.

"Now are we finally ready?" Dean pressed his face to her throat as she carried him down the hall and back into his bedroom, right up until he had to let go so she could tuck him into bed. Then he watched her, wide-eyed awake in the moonlight, until she blew him a kiss and pressed her finger to her lips and closed his bedroom door again.

She was barely downstairs before she heard the patter of little feet once more, and instead of dimming the lamps as she intended she headed straight for her husband's side.

"You've spoilt him rotten, now you've got to deal with the consequences," she said, distracting him from his newspaper with a kiss to his forehead. "He thinks Sammy is his new toy."

"Sammy is his new toy," said John, folding up his newspaper with an indulgent grin on his face. "Boys will be boys, Mary. I'll go take care of it."

"See that you do," she said. "I'll get the lights."

He switched the autophonograph on before he headed upstairs, brass tubing carrying the sound up to a horn mounted in Dean's bedroom, and as she dimmed the gaslights and damped the fire she hummed along with the faint music carrying back down the stairs. When all else failed it had always been the one sure way to get Dean to settle.

Dean always did get himself wound up about things, unlike his baby brother who'd been an absolute angel ever since he was born.

So to speak.

Only when she'd set everything to rights for the night did Mary join her husband upstairs, pushing the nursery door open a crack and peering inside.

"Did you get Dean to sleep already?" she asked as she saw him lean over the crib to check on their infant son.

He remained silent, though, and a few moments later she closed the door again just as quietly for fear of waking Sam when he'd only just fallen asleep. A little further down the hall she pushed open the door to Dean's bedroom.

"Oh, John, it's too loud," she called back down the hall before she even got inside, turning to head downstairs to make the adjustment. But before she could get so much as a step away from the door, her blood ran cold when John answered her from inside.

"Dean likes it that way."

"Oh God," she gasped, tearing back down the hall to the nursery, to the shadowy figure of someone _not_ her husband leaning over Sam's crib.

"You!" she gasped as the man turned towards her, showing his true face.

The next thing out of her mouth was a scream.

: : :

"...and across his lap lay a rifle, also seemingly painted black, and a belt of arms of the same somber hue was about his waist." Dean's eyes were just beginning to close, both hands curled around the edge of the patchwork quilt that he'd pulled to his chin, one clutching a piece of John's father's old uniform, the other a small star detail from what Mary'd told him was her family crest. "The horse was saddle and bridleless, and stood with head erect gaz--"

John's head jerked up at the sound of his wife's scream, the book instantly dropped atop his son's quilt. "Stay here," he said, knocking the chair over in his haste to dash down the hall.

But everything was quiet in the nursery, the only sound the music coming out the wide open door of Dean's room. Sam was waving his chubby legs in his crib and whatever had frightened Mary, it had obviously been fleeting. A spider, or a mouse. She'd probably gone downstairs to fetch their largest skillet to dispatch the pest.

John reached down into the crib and grabbed hold of Sam's ankle, shaking it playfully as Sam kicked up against him. In his hand he clutched one of Dean's tin soldiers, a smear of red paint across his face.

"I've got to take better care painting their hats next time," he said, but when he ran his thumb over the smear, it came away wet. He looked at his thumb uncertainly, then at his son's cheek where he spotted another smear of red. Something told him not to look up - _don't do it, you don't want to know_ \- but he did anyway, he had to.

And there she was, pinned to the ceiling, splayed out obscenely with her belly slashed.

"Mary!" he shouted, dropping to his knees. "Sweet Jesus, Mary!"

As he watched the body burst into flames, taking the entire ceiling with it. Part of him was still slack-jawed with horror at the sight; the other more pragmatic part knew that here on the edge of town the fire brigade wouldn't arrive until the whole damn house had gone up.

"Daddy?" he heard from the doorway, shoving him into action. He snatched Sam up from his crib and pressed him into his brother's small arms.

"Don't look, Dean," he said, "just take your brother outside as fast as you can. Go, Dean."

Dean did look, but then he turned and ran, just like his father told him to.

Music from Dean's room was still barely audible over the crackling of the fire, as John looked for something, anything, to put the fire out. But then he looked up again and met Mary's dead eyes and knew that nothing could be done. Even now, when the life was already gone from her, she was telling him that his sons needed to come first.

He said a silent good-bye as the fire spread to the curtains, the dresser, the crib, and sprinted out of the house to catch up with his sons.

Without even pausing he scooped them up under his arm as he passed and carried them out onto the street, to safety. Only when they were there, ash-smeared and breathless and teary, did he finally heard a fire siren begin to sound up and down the streets.

He didn't know what in God's name had just happened, but he knew, for his boys' sake, for his _own_ sake, that he needed to find out.

 

**PRESENT DAY**

_Stanford University, 1905_

Sam had never known anyone quite like Jessica Moore, which he was selfishly glad for because there was just one of her and she was his, as much as Jessica Moore was anybody's.

"You'll be missed soon," he said, glancing at his open window, cool night air fluttering the curtains and blowing a pile of papers askew. "Your new housemate has a wagging tongue."

"Do you think she's going to be picking my lock and checking my bed now?" said Jess breezily, putting her tweezers down and pushing her magnifying spectacles up onto her forehead. "I've not been missed before and I'll not be missed now. We have until just before dawn, as always."

Till dawn was still never quite long enough.

"Do you hear something?" he said, cocking his ear towards the sitting room. "I didn't forget to lock my doors, did I?"

"Sam Winchester forgetting to do something? Perish the thought," she said, reaching for her tinted goggles. "Pass me the soldering rod, would you?"

"I wish you wouldn't set things on fire in my bedroom," he said, kissing her hair before listening for the indistinct noise again, this time following it to the bedroom door. Three years and change at Stanford and still he was attuned to the smallest disturbance; some things you just never shook. Some things you didn't try too hard to.

"I thought you _liked_ it when things got hot in here," she called at his back as he poked his head into the darkened sitting room. It was a moment before the barely discernable shadow by the door caught his attention, but less than a moment after that for him to stalk across the room and reach for the intruder.

He might have left the life, but he hadn't forgotten anything. Neither, apparently, had the intruder. Three moves had Sam on his back. A fourth had the intruder on his.

"Dean?" said Sam, as the fluttering of the curtains and the fortuitous movement of a cloud settled a beam of moonlight directly on his brother's face. Dean just grinned up at him and, in Sam's moment of weakness, pushed him off.

"Little brother," he said, getting to his feet and brushing imaginary dirt off his trousers. "It's good to see you again."

"Dean, what are you doing here?" he hissed, rolling right to his feet again, his eyes darting to the open bedroom door. "You can't be here."

"Since when can't I pay my little brother a visit?" said Dean, his gaze following Sam's to the bedroom door. "Did I interrupt something, is that it?"

"Nothing you'd be interested in," said Sam, moving to block his way. But it was a gesture he knew was in vain from the moment he made it; not only would it just rouse Dean's curiosity, but their audible discussion was bound to rouse Jess's.

When she appeared in the doorway it was stockingfoot and disheveled, her hair unbound and trailing over her shoulders. It was as Sam was accustomed to seeing her, and everything that would give Dean the wrong impression.

"You've got to love a town where the whores make house calls."

"Dean! She's a student at the university with me."

"And she's unlaced in your rooms at this time of night?" said Dean. "Congratulations, Sammy, I didn't know you had it in you."

"Dean!"

"It's all right, Sam," she said coolly, stepping forward and offering Dean her hand. "I'm Jessica."

"Unusual," said Dean, kissing her knuckles in mock Shakespearean style.

"My father was a actor."

"Of course," said Dean. "So you _are_ disreputable."

"Not yet, but I hope to be one day," she said, taking her hand back. "Sam, you didn't tell me your brother piloted an airship. I don't think you need to worry about the cold of altitude here, though, Dean."

Dean grinned as though he'd just been paid a compliment, which Sam supposed it had been, for someone like Dean. The coat was a leather affair, comfortably worn from long use, straps and buckles binding it to his body. Sam hadn't seen it before, but nonetheless it seemed very much the sort of thing his brother would wear, impractical as it might be.

"If it's a life of disrepute you want, I'm the Winchester brother you're better off knowing," he said.

"If you're going to be this way, I'll thank you to wait another three years to visit," said Sam. "Would Dad let you get away with that?"

"Dad's not here," said Dean, "which is why I am." He paused to glance at Jess again, standing there shamelessly and watching their conversation. "Is there somewhere we can go talk?"

"I fail to see what we have to talk about," said Sam. "It's far from the first time he's gone off in his own. What saloon did you last see him in? I suggest you start there and work your way outwards through the alleys."

"Sam," said Dean, a familiar warning note in his voice. "We're going to talk about this. The only thing you get to decide is whether we do it here or someplace else."

"And you wonder why I chose to come west in the first place," said Sam tightly. He could wait for Dean to give in, but he knew from long experience that those battles of wills could be endless. "Jess, if you'll excuse us?"

"Don't rouse your landlady," was the only stipulation she made, "unless you want to explain my presence in your rooms."

"We'll be quiet," he promised her. "Won't we, Dean?"

"Quiet as church mice," Dean said, flashing her an all-too-familiar grin. She wasn't buying what he was selling, but she nodded and disappeared back into Sam's bedroom to get back to her work.

"Pretty girl," said Dean. "How did you managed to coax her inside?"

"This is not a conversation I care to have with you," said Sam, showing him the door. "Let's take a walk."

Before Sam could get him outside, Dean ran his thumb over the square of cloth at the corner of Sam's window, a perfectly formed pentacle on a red background.

"I guess old habits die hard, huh, Sammy?"

"Leave it alone, Dean," said Sam and, grabbing his coat, led Dean outside into the night.

: : :

"There are easier ways to get in touch with me than breaking into my home," said Sam, walking Dean down the deserted street. "I didn't even know you knew where I lived."

"Of course I knew, Sam," said Dean, hands in his pockets and kicking up dust. "I've always known."

"And yet for three years you stayed away."

"Technically you've only been living here for two years this past June," Dean pointed out. "You lived your first year in the residences." Sam remained silent, not feeling that kind of pedantry deserved a response. "Look, you wanted some distance between you and Dad, and I gave it to you."

"Until now," said Sam. "Why are you really here?"

"I told you, Sam, Dad's gone missing. We were supposed to rendezvous in Salem a week ago but he never showed up. I waited a couple of days to see if there would be a message, but there was nothing. Not a word."

"He might've been held up somewhere," said Sam. "It's happened before."

"He always sends word, Sam, you know he does. He knows how to use the telegraph office as well as anyone, and he knew where we were supposed to meet. Something's happened. I need your help with this one."

"I'm out, Dean," said Sam. "I'm done with that life. This, what you see here, this is my life now."

"Yeah, you're so out you keep a hunters' symbol in your window?" said Dean. "No, I know you. You're not out, you've just been dormant. But it's springtime now, Sammy, and it's time to sprout and face the sunshine."

"First of all, it's October," said Sam, "and secondly... did you just compare hunting to _sunshine_?"

"It was a metaphor, Sam. You know literature was never my strong suit," said Dean. "Will you help me? Just this once?"

Sam pinched his lips together and sighed through his nose, staring off into the distance while they walked aimlessly through the street. "I'm an advanced student, Dean. My absence will be noticed."

"So get your lady friend to make your excuses and apologies," said Dean. "Have you forgotten how to fake an illness? We've both done it dozens of times."

"For a day or two, perhaps," said Sam.

"A week," said Dean. "Give me a week. I'll have you back for Halloween, you have my word."

"A week," repeated Sam, "and not an hour more. I suppose I could feign a family emergency."

"This _is_ a family emergency," said Dean. "Your father is missing, Sam. I'd think any professor worth his salt would accept that as a reason for your absence."

"Except that they might ask questions I don't care to answer," said Sam.

"Then tell them he's a drunk, just like you tell everyone else," said Dean. "A week, Sam. You and me together again, we'll figure this one out. We have to."

Sam wasn't sure what had Dean all fired up about this; it certainly wasn't the first time John Winchester had vanished from their lives only to reappear again without a word of explanation. But Dean had always been the closer to their father of the two of them and he clearly _was_ distraught, in his way. No matter what had transpired three years ago, Dean was still his brother. He was very nearly the only family Sam had.

"Where did he go missing?"

"He was checking out Jericho station, just north of here," said Dean, grinning and clapping him on the shoulder. "Something about a ghost train; I can check my notes. It'll be just like old times, Sammy."

"That's what I'm afraid of," said Sam. "The train through San Francisco leaves at seven. We'll want to get some sleep soon if we want to be on it."

"Forget the train, I've got something better than that," said Dean, leading him up past the carriages on the street to what was clearly - and deservedly - his pride and joy.

"You have an automobile?"

"I _made_ an automobile," Dean corrected him. "Took me six months of blood, sweat and tears up at Uncle Bobby's workshop, but it surpasses anything else on the road."

Sam had never seen anything quite like it. Far from the other automobiles he'd seen in the city, this one could be completely encased from the elements with overlapping flaps of leather and hinged pieces of brass, with a solid plate of glass at the front. A great copper boiler sat in the back surrounded by a series of mechanisms that Sam could not even begin to decipher.

"It's only got two seats," he said, for lack of an ability to articulate any other thoughts he had about the machine.

"Anything more than two is just excessive," said Dean. "The rest of the space is for storage."

"Dad always said to travel light and fast," said Sam.

"Dad never had anything like this to travel the country in," said Dean, patting his creation fondly. "Hard to strap much more than a scattergun and a pistol to the side of a horse."

"Though God knows we tried," said Sam, finally offering him a smile. "Well, it's nice to see you've been putting your free time to good use. How's Uncle Bobby?"

"Same as he's always been," said Dean. If he knew that Sam and Bobby had exchanged a few letters over the years, he didn't mention it. "Want to take it for a spin?"

"Something tells me it'll wake up the whole neighborhood," said Sam. "We'll want to wait till morning all the same."

"Forget that, my baby runs like a whisper. You just want to see your Jessica again before we go," said Dean, then held up a hand before Sam could say a word. "No, no need to explain. If there's one thing I understand, it's women."

Privately Sam thought if there was one thing Dean _didn't_ understand, it was women, but he didn't say a word about it. Instead he just turned them about and started heading back to the boarding house he called home.

Somehow he'd always known that hunting wasn't a life he'd be able to leave behind forever. It had just caught up with him sooner than he thought it would.

: : :

Jessica saw them off, her eyes still a little fiery after her late night conversation with Sam when he returned with Dean in tow. While she had never demanded much of him, other than respect, she wasn't the least bit pleased that he wouldn't explain to her why he had to go.

"I left the window unlatched," said Sam, giving her a brotherly kiss on the cheek as Dean started up his road steamer and lingered by the door as the pressure built up. "For whenever you need to use it."

"That's why I like you best," she said, kissing his cheek in return. "Be safe, Sam. This place wouldn't be the same without you."

"As safe as I can be," he said, the only real promise he could make her under the circumstances. "I'll be back in a week at most."

"You'd better," she said, as Dean motioned for Sam to throw his sack in the storage hold and get in. "Good-bye, Sam. Good-bye, Dean."

"Be seeing you around, Good Looking," said Dean, winking at her and ducking into the vehicle before she could respond.

Sam just gave her a helpless look and joined him.

"Could you be any more inappropriate?"

"Without even breaking a sweat," said Dean, "but I was on my best behavior because she's your lady friend. It just figures you'd find someone like that."

"Like what, exactly?" said Sam. "Smart? Strong? Independent?"

"If that's what you want to call it," said Dean, navigating them down the middle of the street, narrowly missing spooking a couple of horses. "If you're so fond of her, why isn't there a ring on her finger?"

"Because she doesn't want to be known as one of those girls who went to college just to find someone to marry," said Sam. "Not that you're one to talk about fingers and rings. At least I'm not paying for it."

"You always pay for it, Sam," said Dean. "One way or another. Did I teach you nothing?"

"Nothing I found useful at Stanford," Sam lied, putting an end to that particular conversation. He wanted Dean to know about Jess, and vice versa, because he wanted a life that enveloped both of them, but not like this. Not with Dean starting off argumentative and Jess starting off affronted.

"Come on, Sam, does it have to be like this?" said Dean, picking up speed while the road was good.

"She means a lot to me, Dean," said Sam. "You could respect that. I would think you'd be the first person to encourage me to find myself an unorthodox girl."

"Hey, if you want to abandon your family forever and set up house with your Jessica, that's your business," said Dean.

Sam was silent for a few moments, a tactic that worked more often with his university friends when he wanted to move on from a particular topic. They knew Sam was closed-mouthed about many things, particularly to do with his family, and respected that boundary. (So long as they didn't have a few drinks in them, but even then they knew enough to tread carefully.) Dean had no such respect, or maybe he just didn't recognize the boundaries. They'd never really had any before.

"She is your Jess, isn't she? You're not going to try to tell me that you're attempting to remain friends while you're still students."

Sam let his silence linger a little longer, then let out a soft sigh. "She wouldn't call herself that," he said. "She'd probably sooner call me her Sam."

"I can't believe I missed all that," said Dean, and this, an answer instead of a stubborn silence, seemed to finally satisfy him. "So what do you think of my Tessa?"

"Your who?" said Sam.

"My Tessa," said Dean, patting his steering wheel. "My automobile, Sammy. What do you think of her? She's a beauty."

"I thought I was used to seeing automobiles in the city, but I've never seen one quite like this," he said. "She's got quite a bit of power."

"More than anyone else on the road," said Dean, "not that you see that many automobiles in the places I drive her. Or roads, for that matter. But Tessa, she can handle anything. I made sure of that."

"You don't miss your horse?"

"She's getting fat in Caleb's pasture," said Dean, "and seems all the happier for it. Sure, she could go a few places Tessa can't go, and she cornered better, I'll tell you that much, but Tessa's got some tricks up her sleeve that'll knock your boots off, Sammy."

"Well, let's save those for another day," he said. "I'd like to make it to Jericho Station alive, if it's all the same to you."

"Well then sit tight, because even at Tessa's speed, we still have a long way to go."

 

_Jericho Station, California_

There was a shoddy little hotel, a dry goods store, a blacksmith and a saloon: that was all that had risen from the earth around Jericho Station. It was a familiar sight, not from Sam's recent life but from all the years before it. Palo Alto was barely more than the college it held, but it was still substantially more than this.

"I've got our old army tent," said Dean, leaning on his automobile door as he surveyed the scene, "unless you want to brave that hotel."

"I think that's the sort of place where you can expect to find people vying for your company, and the dollars in your pocket," said Sam, but still, it was a hotel and thus likely better than the tent Dean carried, no matter what the clientele. "We'll have to ask if Dad's been here, of course."

"You let me worry about that," said Dean. "You don't even know what he looks like anymore. You can make yourself useful asking around the station to see if this legend people have written home about is something they made up."

"What does he look like, then?" said Sam, not letting Dean get away with just that. "If I don't know what he looks like, then what does he look like now?"

"You gave him a lot of gray when you took off, Sam."

"Me? _I_ turned him gray?" sputtered Sam. "After everything we've seen and done, you think you can put that on me?"

"I just call it like I see it, Sam," he said, leaning against Tessa and crossing his arms. "He looks older than you remember him. But then again, so do you."

"That's because you remember the boy I used to be," said Sam sharply. "Shall I meet you back here?"

"Meet me in the saloon," said Dean, completely missing the way Sam bristled at the orders. "We'll both have some questions to ask there, and I could sure use a beer after that drive." And, it remained unsaid, after this conversation.

Sam tipped his hat at him and headed round the front side of the station, not looking back. If John Winchester had aged over the past three years, it was on his own head and not on Sam's.

"Excuse me," he said, at the first gentleman he passed, but was soundly ignored. Not entirely unsurprisingly; he didn't always have the time for strangers stopping him in public places either. Better to target the people who were here regularly, and to that end went straight for the station guard. In his experience, in a lightly trafficked station like this one, they were usually eager for a chat.

"Excuse me," he said. "I was wondering about something, and was hoping you might be able to sate my curiosity."

"Well, I'll do what I can," he said, "but unless it's to do with the railroad, I'm not sure I can help you."

"Oh, it does," Sam assured him. "This might seem like a silly question, but I received a letter from my sister some time ago, after she and her husband traveled through to Portland, and she mentioned that she heard the strangest tale of a ghost train that travels through this station."

"Oh, that old story," he said. "You're certainly not the first chap to come through here asking about it. Rubbish if you ask me, though."

"So there is a tale to be told then," said Sam. "My sister's so fanciful sometimes, I thought she might've made it all up."

"Oh no, that tale's been told around here ever since they laid these tracks down," he said. "Some kind of ghost locomotive that whisks its way through here in the dead of night. I never paid the stories much mind."

"So you've never seen it then," said Sam. "Not that I put much stock in those stories either, of course, but my sister was so insistent."

"Neither hide nor hair," he said. "People like to tell stories, that's all it is. A place isn't interesting till it's had a ghost story told about it. Not that this place could be made interesting even with one."

"Well, thank you for your time," said Sam, tipping his hat to him and turning away.

"That's not how the story goes, you know."

He hadn't realized that anyone had been listening in on their conversation, but he wasn't sorry that someone had been. A young lady, as it turned out, looking somewhat intrigued - or was it amused? - by what she'd overheard.

"You've heard the story then?" he said. "My sister was vague on the details but she seemed quite taken with it."

"He's got it all wrong," she said, motioning for Sam to walk with her, "though stories always do get bent and twisted with the retelling. Come, sit with me while I wait for the train and I'll tell it to you properly."

"Of course," he said, joining her on the bench in front of the grand station clock, poised at five minutes to six. "You're here on your own?"

"My brother will be joining me," she said briskly, seeming quite unconcerned about his absence. "He had to take a later train - business, you understand - but he'll be here any time now. Perhaps even on this next one."

"Of course," said Sam, removing his hat. "And the ghost story?"

"It's not a ghost train at all," she said, "though the ghost does come late at night, so at least people are still telling that part right. It's a ghost _on_ a train - the overnight from San Francisco. It's very specific."

"Fascinating," said Sam. "I'd love to hear all the details. When I next visit my sister, I'm sure she'd be absolutely rapt. Not that I should be encouraging her fascination, but I feel it's my duty as her brother to indulge her whims."

"I'm sure your sister and my brother would get along famously," she said with a bright, guileless smile. "The way I heard it, it's the ghost of a young woman they call Connie - though to be fair, I've also heard her called Carrie, and even _Charlie_ \- who was killed nearby while they were constructing the railroad."

"Murdered?"

"An accident, or so they say. There are all sorts of mishaps people will call an accident when it's convenient. Now, when the mood strikes her, she'll stalk this very station and choose one unwary traveler to whisk away on the midnight train with her. Somewhere between Jericho Station and Atlas Station, whomever she's chosen vanishes forever."

"And you believe this happens?" said Sam. "Perhaps you know someone they claim it's happened to?"

"No, not at all," she said, smiling again, her lashes slightly lowered. "It's as though someone developed a recipe for the perfect story and used it to tell this tale, don't you think? Drama, revenge and vanishings. They say she always chooses someone who's traveling alone as her victim, so that not a soul notices they're missing until far too late."

"It certainly makes me reconsider traveling alone," said Sam. "And also grateful my sister was traveling with her husband, whether there's any merit to this story or not."

"Well, even if it's single travelers she's after, I'm quite certain my brother is still quite safe," she said. "He's a great bull of a man; no target for anybody, particularly not a wisp of a girl ghost."

"I don't suppose our material laws apply to the supernatural," said Sam, careful not to reveal any actual knowledge. "A wisp of a girl ghost might be more powerful than you think."

"Are you trying to frighten me?" she said with a girlish smile. "If so, you'll have to try harder than _that_. I have got brothers, after all."

"Not on purpose, I assure you," said Sam quickly, though he matched her smile, just for a moment. He could hear an approaching thunder behind them, then a great whistle, the sound of a train arriving on time. "I expect that's for you," he said, standing up and offering her a hand to help her up as well. "Thank you for your time--"

"Margaret," she supplied.

"Thank you for your time, Margaret. That's just the story I was looking for."

"It was my pleasure," she said. "Thank you for keeping me company while I waited for the train, Sam."

"Would you like me to stay with you until you determine whether or not your brother is on board?"

"Oh, that won't be necessary," she assured him. "I've waited for him before, and if he's not aboard then I'll wait for him again. But thank you for the offer all the same."

"As you wish," said Sam, and tipped his hat at her before getting out of the way of the platform as the train arrived at the station.

: : :

"So we've got a name," said Dean. "Sort of. Possibly. If it's not actually something else entirely, and if our girl ghost is not actually a man named Charlie. We've worked with less."

His trip to the hotel had been nearly as fruitful as Sam's to the platform, if in a different direction. He'd not only found someone to give him the location of the nearest churchyard, he also had a roughly sketched map of how to reach it. The path and location were barely more than scrawls on the slip of newsprint, but it was a treasure all the same.

"Of course, they think we're proper and God-fearing men now," said Dean, "but we're both used to that. Or has it been so long you've forgotten?"

"I haven't forgotten," said Sam. And even if he had, he'd always had stronger faith than Dean to begin with. A God-fearing man was not a difficult role for him to play. "You could have tried harder to get us a room. The hotel looked clean enough."

"Even I can't make a room exist where there wasn't one before," said Dean. "You've just gone soft, Sam. We've spent more nights on the ground than we ever did in a bed."

"That doesn't mean I have to like it," said Sam. "It's nice having a home with a bed, Dean. I'm looking forward to being back in it."

"With someone like your Jessica in it, I can't say I blame you, Sammy," said Dean, pressing the crude map into Sam's hand and reaching into his automobile for what Sam knew was going to be their home for the night. Maybe the same tent he'd been sleeping in on and off for most of his life.

"It's not as sordid as you make it out to be, you know," he said. "Jess and I do a lot of interesting work together."

"Is that what you call it so nobody catches on?"

"I don't know why I tell you anything," muttered Sam.

"Actually, you _don't_ tell me anything," said Dean, emerging triumphant with an armful of canvas and poles and pressing it into Sam's arms. "Sorry, I stopped worrying about folding things properly when I found I had more space to haul things around in."

"That explains your clothing," said Sam, giving it a judgmental once over even though the condition was no different from when they were growing up. Very little in their lives had ever had a woman's touch, and their clothing was no exception.

Though admittedly, in the years since Sam had last seen him Dean had definitely taken a turn for the more unconventional. Sam would never admit, to Dean or anyone else, that it suited him.

"Shut your piehole and set up the tent," said Dean, finding one more pole wedged in with the knives and yanking it out. "You'll probably need this."

Sam put it, and the rest of the tent, on the ground in the middle of the clearing they'd claimed for the night.

"I have no idea how you've managed on your own."

"Sleeping in my Tessa, a lot of the time," he said. "The tent's nice enough, though. It's not like that one Dad used to make us sleep in, barely room to sit up."

"Dad liked to pack light."

It was practically the mantra of their youth. At first, it was nothing they couldn't fling into the boxcar of a moving train. Then it was nothing that would slow down a horse. Even after Sam had a home of his own - or a couple of rooms of his own, which was closer to the truth - he still found the habit a hard one to shake. If there was clutter accumulation in his current accommodation, it belonged almost entirely to Jess.

"That's because Dad never had anything as extraordinary as my automobile," said Dean.

"So," said Sam.

"So?"

"You never told me," said Sam. "Was he here? Did Dad ever show up in Jericho Station?"

"Maybe," said Dean with a half shrug, closing the door of the automobile. "Maybe not. The bartender at the saloon said he thought he remembered him, but Dad doesn't exactly stick out. He likes not to be remembered."

"What about the hotel?"

"None of his usual aliases ever checked in," said Dean. "If he was here - which he almost certainly was - he probably did the same thing we are. Maybe even in this exact spot. What I can tell you for sure is there's no sign of him here now; this town's not big enough to hide in."

Sam looked around for the remains of a campfire, even though the odds of them choosing the same patch of land were slim. He found two without having to do more than turn in a circle, and no reason to believe that either belonged to their father.

"How is he?"

"Do you really care, or do you just think you should ask?"

Sam smoothed out the map against this thigh, traced a trail with his fingertip from one edge of the paper to the other in the dying light. It didn't look far, but on a map with no scale and no landmarks it could be one mile or twenty.

"Will there be someone at the church tomorrow?" he said finally.

"Does it matter?" said Dean. "If the records are there, we'll get our hands on them, and if they're not we have a whole boneyard to explore."

There were some parts of the job that Sam missed even less than others.

"Please tell me you've got a device that will do that part of the job for us?" he said, turning the map on an angle to match the lie of the land.

"A device that will systematically tour graveyards and read tombstones?" said Dean. "In your dreams, Sammy."

"I'd settle for something that can dig in the dark of night."

"I could do that," said Dean, "but it would be neither quiet nor portable. Sometimes elbow grease is still the best alternative. You aren't scared of a little hard work, are you? Have you gone all soft on me?"

"I haven't spent much time these past three years digging up graves, no," said Sam. But that didn't mean he didn't still know how, couldn't still feel the first jarring shovelfuls of earth, and the way they made his biceps ache with the strain.

"Don't worry, it's like riding a bicycle," said Dean. "Something I'm sure you have had lots of experience with these past few years."

"Worry isn't the word I would use to describe what I'm feeling right now."

"Is that so? Then what word would you use?"

Sam opened the vehicle door again and carefully placed his frock coat inside, safe from the elements and his brother's neglect for proper preservation. He wouldn't be needing it here where they were alone, and probably not until they reached the church tomorrow, however they planned on getting there.

He'd barely reunited with his brother, barely begun this hunt, but already he could feel the transformation in himself, not into someone new, and not into someone more like his brother, but into a person he'd been suppressing with his home and his manners and his education. It was an uneasy sensation, not feeling entirely at home with any of who he was, had been, or eventually would be.

"That tent's not going to erect itself, Sam," said Dean as Sam shut up the car and rolled up his sleeves.

"Something else you need to work on," muttered Sam, and set to work, whistling a popular tune. At least, it was a popular tune in his head. By the time it came out of him it was so unrecognizable that he could see his brother wince. That just made him whistle louder.

"You gonna do that all night?" said Dean. "You're going to attract bullfrogs or something."

"Jessica never minds my whistling."

"Well I hate to be the one to break it to you, then, but your lady friend is tone deaf," said Dean.

"Maybe she is," said Sam. "Maybe we're perfect together."

"How can you be perfect together when she doesn't even know you?" said Dean. "I know you better than her, Sam. I know you better than anyone."

"Do you?" said Sam, under his breath, setting up tent poles with the ease of someone who'd done it a hundred times, even though it had been years. Some things imprinted themselves so deeply you were never rid of them.

While he did that, Dean built up the fire, and there was very little else to say before they called it a night.

: : :

They managed to take Tessa to the church because the trail was wide and clear, and because, as Sam was quickly learning, Dean never walked anywhere he could drive. Tessa might've run pretty quiet, compared to some automobiles Sam had encountered, but she still made sneaking up on anybody a more dicey prospect, particularly over rough terrain.

"Anybody home?" said Dean, pushing open the heavy wooden doors with both hands then standing right between them. If there was anyone in the church, there was no way they could miss him.

"I think it's just you and God," said Sam, urging him forward.

"Well then I hope God doesn't mind a little bit of petty espionage," said Dean, striding between the crooked wooden pews, heels kicking up a faint trail of dust.

"No more than he's minded any other time you've done it, anyway," said Sam, following more delicately, careful on the worn wooden floors. The thin sheen of dust on them was a result of the location and not a lack of care. "But that's between you and your maker."

"Don't you start," said Dean, peering in the chapel and then the office. "Hell, we didn't even have to pick a lock."

"Don't say hell in a church, Dean," said Sam. "At least, not out of its proper context."

"Hey, a person could argue we're doing God's work, if he wanted to," said Dean. "Pastor Jim would." Having determined there really was no one else around, he didn't even pretend he wasn't searching for records. "You know we're probably going to have to search the graveyard."

"I've been bracing myself," admitted Sam, finally meeting him at the door to the church office, where Dean was, far from making a mess, efficiently and systematically making his way through every drawer.

"Aw, Sammy, you used to like them," he said. "Remember how we used to play hide and go seek when Dad was burning bodies?"

"I always found the better hiding places," said Sam. "You could never stay still long enough. All I had to do was wait you out."

"Good times," said Dean, leafing through a hand-bound book. "I've got death records."

"You have my attention," said Sam, coming inside to look over his shoulder. Of the two of them, he'd always been better at deciphering handwriting. "We're looking for something from when the railroad came through. 1860?"

"Within a couple of years of that, anyway," said Dean. "Connie. Connie. Connie. I don't see anything."

"It's probably short of something," said Sam. "Try Constance. Constance something." What was the other name Margaret had given him? "Or Carrie. Caroline."

"What do you think I'm doing?" said Dean, looking again through the very short list of names. "There's nothing here, Sam."

"Well, it was worth a shot," said Sam, reaching over his shoulder to gently close the book in his hands. Not that he didn't trust Dean's skills, but he hadn't spotted anything even resembling the name in question. Let's go back outside, Dean. We shouldn't intrude any more than we absolutely need to."

Far from intruding, Dean took the time to make sure everything was back in its place before they moved on to investigate the graveyard, and it couldn't just be because he didn't want to leave any evidence of their visit. There was nothing that could have led back to them, particularly once they left town.

"You take the left side and I'll take the right," said Sam, pushing open the iron gate with one hand. The lingering creak suggested it was a place not visited all that regularly, or if it was, then one no one took the time anymore to care for. Which, as it tended to turn out, was ultimately to their benefit.

It didn't even feel ghoulish anymore, stalking the rows of tombstones, brushing aside debris and tracing old lettering with his fingertips. At least here nothing was so old that it was worn down to the wood, lettering too weather-beaten to read.

"I don't see anything," he said a little while later, looking across the rows to where Dean was squatting down, carefully moving some dead flowers.

"Me neither," said Dean, standing up again, returning the flowers to where they'd been moldering. "If it was a just a nickname, then we're clean out of luck."

"Have you got any other ideas?" said Sam, surveying the graveyard with a glance one last time. Surely there were other churches, other graveyards, but the further afield they went, the less likely they were to find her. This place was their first and best hope.

"Not right this second," said Dean, "but a beer would probably help. Let's head back to the saloon, Sam, and take stock of our options."

Sam just hoped 'take stock of our options' was actually a case-related suggestion and not a new euphemism for any one of Dean's favorite activities, most of which could be conducted in any saloon in the country.

: : :

Ultimately, and inevitably, they ended up back at the train platform some time long after dark, after a few beers and a lot of conversation. Ostensibly they were looking for a flash of inspiration, though Dean also insisted that they try to take a good look at the tracks themselves. Sam, in turn, insisted they wait for the latest train to head through before they stepped onto said tracks.

"God, those things creep my out," said Dean, shuddering dramatically as he sneaked a glance at the ticket-taking automaton, ticking away as its arm raised and lowered with each passenger.

"I never understood that," said Sam. "I always thought they should've been just your thing." And though it was something he had no way of knowing, based on his own childhood toys Sam suspected they were something that had fascinated Dean once. "In fact, I'm surprised you haven't built one of your own."

"They've got dead eyes," said Dean, like that should have been enough explanation in and of itself. "The guts of them are astounding - God I'd like to get my hands inside some of them - but you look at them bobbing back and forth and it's just kind of creepy, don't you think?"

"I guess I never really thought about it that much," said Sam, taking his time walking the length of the station while they waited for the train to pull out again. They were ubiquitous, after all. He didn't think about them much more than he though about shoes, or trains. "They do something that needs to be done."

"Not really," said Dean, shoving his hands in his pockets and scaring the patrons as he rocked right on the edge of the platform, watching the caboose pass him by.

"Wait, do you hear something?" said Sam, a sound from up the tracks catching his attention, just for a second.

"What, you mean like a train?" said Dean. "Yes, I hear a train. In fact, I hear a very loud train, Sammy.

"No, not the train," said Sam. "Something under the train, or maybe _on_ the--" It came again, just loud enough to make out this time, a shrill cry of his name.

"Sam! Saaaaaaam!"

"Okay, _that_ time I heard it," said Dean. "I don't suppose you have an explanation?"

"Oh dear God, that was her," he said, "that was the woman I met, Dean! That's Margaret!"

"Hell of a way to say good-bye."

But Margaret never had any intention of boarding a train, and if she had she certainly wouldn't be shrieking Sam's name out an open window, loud enough for him to hear over the ground of machinery and the rattling of the wheels on the tracks.

"She's not saying good-bye, she's--" Sam didn't even bother to finish the sentence before tugging on Dean's leather sleeve, yanking hard enough to draw Dean into racing back across the station with him to where they'd left Tessa. "She wasn't supposed to be on a train, she was waiting for her brother. Dean, _something dragged her onto that train_."

"Good thing Tessa takes under a minute to warm up," said Dean, though it was the longest minute Sam had ever had to wait through. "Grab your scattergun, Sam, and let's catch this bastard."

"Can you catch the train, Dean?" Sam asked as Dean spun around the station and started heading north-east alongside the tracks.

"Hell yes, I can," he said. "Tessa can catch anything on land. Just hold on tight, Sammy, it's gonna be a bumpy ride."

Bumpy ride was certainly not overstating the case. Sam always felt that any time he was in Tessa and off the well-traveled roads it was a bumpy ride, but that was nothing compared to racing along the barely cleared spans of land next to the train tracks. He'd swear they felt every pebble, every root, every lost tool along the way.

The locomotive was picking up speed fast, but so was Dean, pushing Tessa to limits Sam hadn't even realized she could approach. It wasn't long before they were passing the tail end of it, then the car before that, then the car before that, passengers looking out the window and pointing at the madmen trying to race them.

Sam couldn't hear the cries of his name anymore over the rattling of the automobile and the grinding of the train and the wind in his ears, but he was watching as closely as he ever watched anything. He would know when they reached her.

"Dean, look out!" said Sam, the headlamps on Dean's car barely illuminating the brush in time for Dean to swerve around it, nearly sending Sam flying right out of the vehicle.

They were right there now, keeping pace with the train and pulling in alongside the car where Sam could finally, faintly, hear someone crying out his name again.

"Sam, you're going to have to jump," said Dean, giving his hip an encouraging push.

"Are you kidding me?" said Sam. "I can't jump that, Dean! It's suicide!"

He'd been hopping trains since he was a kid, but never a train going at this kind of speed, and very rarely anything but a boxcar.

"I don't see any other choice," Dean shouted over the wind, one hand on the steering column and the other grappling for something next to his seat. "Here," he said, yanking on a lever and sending an unsteady telescopic pole out from the frame of the vehicle. "This should help."

"A little warning next time?" Sam shouted back, beginning to brace himself against the side of the car. "For a moment I worried you were going to eject my seat!"

"Good idea," said Dean as the pole hooked firmly onto the stairway of the passenger car, holding the two vehicles as close and steady as they were going to get. "I'll work on that next."

For the moment the only thing Dean needed to work on was keeping his speed steady with the locomotive so it _didn't_ become a suicide mission. Sam took a deep breath, tried not to close his eyes, and flung himself across the narrow space between himself and the train.

He thought he heard Dean tell him to hurry, that he could travel alongside the train only as long as the trail remained clear, but there were some things that just didn't need to be said.

: : :

"Sam!"

Sam forced the door open with his shoulder, by this point startling neither the flickering female form nor her victim, the only occupants of this dimly lit passenger car.

"Are you all right, Margaret?"

"Do I look all right?" she said, trapped against the wall right beneath a lantern as the ghost turned her attention to the invader. Sam raised his scattergun and blasted salt right through her, the ghost tearing up into wisps of smoke that swirled and vanished.

"Come on, we've got to get out of here!"

Margaret practically fell away from the wall, the force that had been holding her there releasing her when the spray of salt from Sam's gun hit true.

"Get out of here where?" she said breathlessly, barely avoiding falling to her knees as the floor rocked beneath her. "We're on a train!"

"My brother's waiting," he said, reaching for her arm, but before they could go anywhere the ghost coalesced across the car from them and Sam found himself skidding back on his heels away from the girl he'd arrived to rescue.

"Damn it," he swore, struggling to raise the scattergun again against the counter-efforts of an unseen force.

"Sam!"

The fact that they were both still on the train, that she hadn't vanished like the ghost victims were purported to do, had to mean something, but Sam didn't have the time to figure out just what that was. He could only guess that the ghost was waiting for something, and Sam had to get them both off this train before that something arrived.

There was a splintering crack from outside the passenger car and Sam felt his stomach drop out. He couldn't even look, could only listen until the telltale sounds of Dean's still-running automobile filtered through the rest of the ambient noise. Only then did Sam start breathing again.

He fired his gun without aiming, counting on the scatter effect to sent at least a few particles through the phantom, and finally was able to look out the window to see an intact Tessa and an intact brother, the remains of a sign in pieces inside and over the top of her.

"We're slowing down!"

Unless some cattle had wandered onto the track, there was only one reason to begin slowing down, and that was if they were approaching the next station. One detail of the story sudden became the only one that mattered: Connie's victims always disappeared at some point before the train pulled in.

"We need to get out of here the same way I came in," he said and grabbed her arm, physically hauling her to the open door which was swinging wildly with the motion of the train.

"She's going to come back!"

"That's why we need to get out of here," said Sam, holding the door open bodily, Margaret in one hand and his scattergun in the other. "You need to jump."

"I need to _what_?"

Jumping onto the train had been a dicey prospect. Jumping _off_ it didn't seem much better, even with the continued slowing of the train.

"We don't have much time."

Sam would've pushed her if he had to, but in the end she hiked up her skirts and took a deep breath and hurled herself into the open vehicle landing hard right next to Dean.

His back still braced against the door, Sam fired again, and then again when the spirit returned too quickly for him to make a break for the automobile still racing along the shoulder next to him.

"Sam, come on, I'm running out of road!"

"I'm trying," he shouted back, reloading with a slam of the double barrel and firing again, right through her.

This time when he nailed her with the last of his salt rounds, Connie didn't immediately begin to coalesce somewhere else on the car. Sam took the small blessing for what it was and used those precious few moments - after all, he didn't know how many he was going to get - to make a leap of faith back into Dean's steamer.

The moment Margaret and Sam were in the car Dean slammed the lever back down again and the arm that had been keeping him latched to the train - now warped and buckled from the strain - retracted back halfway, just enough to let them go. It was barely in time.

They were still going at a respectable speed when another signpost loomed in the darkness directly in front of them. Dean swerved to avoid it, but ended up skidding down a shallow embankment instead, coming to a very sudden stop at the bottom.

The automobile sputtered to a stop and for a few moments there was only the sound of the retreating train, the birds of night-time in the nearby trees, and a lot of heavy breathing.

"Everyone all right?" said Dean finally.

"I think so," said Sam, not daring to move for a moment. When he did, though, he discovered that everything seemed to be in working order. "Margaret?"

"I'm here," she said, though Sam could tell that already from the way her body was pressed up against his. What he hadn't been certain of was whether that body was still intact.

The sound of the train grew quieter as it finished pulling in to the next station, until all they were left with were the noises of one another.

"She didn't come with us, did she?" said Dean.

"Of course I did," said Margaret. "I was practically hurled into this... automobile."

"No, not you, sweetheart," said Dean. "The ghost."

If she had, though, they would have almost certainly known it by now; the ghost on the train had been anything but subtle.

"I think she disappeared just before I got off the train," said Sam. "Either she gave up, or--"

"Or she didn't want to arrive at the station," said Dean, finally pushing open the door to his side of the vehicle and stumbling out. "Oh, my poor darling. Don't worry, I'll get you fixed up right."

Sam climbed out the way he'd come in then opened the door - forcing a branch out of the way in the process - and offered Margaret his hand.

"Where are we?" she said, smoothing her skirts as soon as Sam let go of her hand.

"Well, according to that sign we just managed not to plow out of the ground, we're a mile out of Atlas Station," said Dean. "At least, I think that's what it said. I lost one of my headlamps in the first crash."

"How's Tessa?" said Sam, carefully closing the door.

"Tessa? Who's Tessa?" said Margaret, eyeing the automobile as though they might have a young lady stashed somewhere inside. Sam couldn't deny that, if they unloaded all their gear, there would be more than enough room for one.

"Tessa's this sweet lady," said Dean, caressing the driver's-side door.

"You named your automobile Tessa?"

"After Nikola Tesla," said Dean, "and if you don't know who that is, I don't want to hear it." Margaret didn't answer him either way. "With a little elbow grease she'll be fine, but I don't think we're going anywhere till daylight. I hope you don't mind camping, Margie."

"Margaret," she said primly. "And we could walk into Atlas Station."

"By all means, be my guest," said Dean broadly. "You're the one who was just attacked by a spirit, but if you want to walk a mile in the dark back to the very train she dragged you onto, that's certainly your choice to make."

She huffed, but she didn't go anywhere.

"That's what I thought," said Dean. "Sammy, you want to get the camping gear out while I... entertain your friend?"

"I've got a better idea," said Sam. "Why don't you get the camping gear out while Margaret and I take a walk to settle our nerves."

"Settle _your_ nerves?" said Dean. "I'm the one who had to drive!"

"Dean...." said Sam, shaking his head, just a tiny flick from side to side.

Margaret moved closer to his side, which Sam took as an acceptance of his unspoken invitation. He offered her his arm which she took at once, though she didn't smile as she did. Sam couldn't have expected that much, not after everything, though at least Margaret wasn't trembling as she clutched him.

"I think my brother needs a few moments alone with Tessa anyway," he said softly as he led her away from the site of their little mishap, towards the edge of the woods where the songbirds seemed to linger. In fact, he imagined Dean shedding a tear or two the moment they were out of sight.

"He does seem to have an unnatural attachment to it," said Margaret, looking back over her shoulder only for a moment. "I haven't thanked you yet for saving my life. I can't imagine anyone else doing what you did."

"Well, my family has never been known for making the safe choice," said Sam ruefully. "Are you all right? She didn't hurt you, did she?"

"Other than a few bumps and bruises, I'm quite all right," she assured him. "I haven't any idea what she was planning to do with me, but she didn't seem to want to hurt me."

Sam didn't want to say that he was virtually certain the spirit did want to hurt her, but lost the opportunity before she could. The people who disappeared, after all, had to have gone somewhere, and Sam would bet good money it wasn't any place they wanted to be.

"We don't want to go far," he said, though he expected she wouldn't need to be told that. The light of the moon could only illuminate their way so far.

"Well, I didn't think you were going to lead me off into the woods without so much as a chaperone," she said, her voice lightly suggesting that perhaps she though he might do just that. That in fact, she might welcome it.

Sam coughed politely and decided the best course of action was to avoid the subject altogether. It certainly wouldn't be the first time someone they'd rescued had been overly grateful, but that was something he remembered Dean having more of a history of taking advantage of than Sam.

"Oh, what's that?" he said, grateful to spot an unusual mound just inside the first line of trees to distract them from the obvious course of the conversation. "Though I suppose we shouldn't investigate, not at this time of night."

"Of course we should," said Margaret, clutching his arm a little tighter. "And you'll not leave my side while we do, will you?"

So much for a change of subject. But the closer they got the more suspicious Sam grew of the oddly shaped mound of dead grasses near the trees. It was certainly an unnatural growth, and though that was nothing unusual this close to the railway, where there were still many artifacts of their passage, he was too curious now to let it go.

He knelt down and pushed the grasses aside with one hand and discovered, just barely discernable in the dim light, what was unmistakably a wooden grave marker. He couldn't read the words inscribed on it, but he suddenly felt quite certain he knew what they were going to be.

"We need to get back to Dean. Now."

: : :

Margaret held the lantern for them as Sam and Dean cleared the debris and grass away from the grave marker and the ground around it, but the inscription was clear moments after they began their task.

> Constance Welch  
> 1838 - 1861  
> Wife and Mother

"I didn't think she would be real," said Margaret. "Even after she captured me on the train, I didn't think she would be a real person."

"Well, that's where ghosts come from," said Dean. "They all used to be people, at one time or another. Sammy, you know what we need to do."

Sam sighed, his face pinching at the thought, but he knew. Dean nodded at him, then at Margaret, then hiked back up over the hill to where he'd left the second lantern burning by Tessa.

"Where's he going?" she said, turning to watch him, looking uncertain as to why Sam wasn't following him.

"He needs to get some things," said Sam, awkward with the explanation. He took a moment to tuck in his shirt and roll up his sleeves, to avoid having to make it. "We need to... take care of her."

"I don't know what that means," she said. "I don't know if I want to know what that means."

No, she probably didn't, but she was going to before the night was over and there wasn't anything Sam could really do about that.

"You know how I asked you those questions back at the station, the day we met?"

"Of course," she said. "You wanted... you wanted to know the stories about the ghost." Some sort of realization seemed to be dawning, but hadn't entirely arrived yet. "You were... looking for her?"

"We're looking for my father, who was looking for her," Sam clarified, though really it wasn't a pertinent point, from her point of view. "My family... this is sort of what we do."

"You tell ghost stories?"

"We hunt ghosts," he said. "Among other things. There really are ghosts and they really do hurt people and someone needs to do something about that."

And doing something about that sometimes meant doing things that looked, to outsiders, more horrific than the spirit itself. Something Margaret was soon going to realize, as Sam could see Dean coming back over the hill towards them.

"What _are_ you?" she said, her eyes widening with surprise and dismay as Dean returned with shovels.

"You might want to wait by the automobile," said Sam. "You don't need to watch this."

"You're going to desecrate the grave!"

"We're going to do what needs to be done," said Dean, "and if you don't want to watch us do that, sweetheart, then I suggest you take your ribbons and your skirts back to the other side of that hill."

At first she didn't look like she was going anywhere. Then she backed up a few halting steps, her expression unchanging, before turning, hiking up her skirts and following the barely discernable path back to the automobile.

"Dean...."

"Come on, Sam, let's get this done," said Dean shortly. "She'd just be in the way."

"She's scared!"

"Of course she's scared. She's just been trapped by an angry spirit on a hurtling locomotive. And since we actually plan to do something about the spirit, we don't need her here to complain about it."

"I just think you could've been nicer about it," said Sam, turning up shovelfuls of earth. "I remember you being nicer about that sort of thing."

"Yes, well, she's your little friend," said Dean, digging alongside him. "You could have dealt with it yourself if you were that worried about her feelings."

"She's just a girl I met at the station, Dean," said Sam. "You're not only insulting me when you suggest otherwise, but insulting Jessica as well."

"All I know is what I see," said Dean, his shovel breaking through rotten wood very early in their digging. "Not exactly six feet deep."

"It's an unconsecrated grave, Dean," said Sam. "They probably dug only as far as they needed to in order to cover her up again."

There was a grave marker, though, which meant some care had gone into the burial. It was easier to believe they were digging up a grave that had been shoddily thrown together in the first place. It made the whole process harder if he imagined the grave was shallow because that was all her mourners, who may or may not have been her children, had been able to manage by themselves.

"All the better for us," said Dean. "If you've got the matches, I've got the salt."

"You say the sweetest things," said Sam, and dug out a few more shovelfuls of dirt and shards of wood to expose the rotten body for Dean. "At least she's a few years past ripe."

Dean wasted no time dumping salt on the body, a little cloud of white dust rising up from it. "All right, Sam, you remember how to light it up, don't you?"

Some things you never forgot.

As Sam got the matches out he saw a flickering white form at the corner of his vision, dim in the morning light, but she didn't approach, just lingered at the edge of his vision. Her modus operandi was to abduct passengers onto a train; this was outside of her parameters. If anything, her hovering seemed almost expectant.

Maybe even hopeful.

As Sam light a match and dropped it into the shallow grave, the form flickered a few more times then winked out of existence.

: : :

"So what do you think?" said Dean as they finished packing their things back into the vehicle. "Suicide?" Morning had brought enough light to work by, and enough light to work by meant Dean had Tessa back up in running condition in under an hour.

More light also meant that Margaret had wandered off on her own while they finished their work. She'd seemed horrified the night before at what she'd witnessed, but as morning dawned and she contemplated her own narrow escape, she drew closer to Sam again. He couldn't imagine she'd forgotten what she'd seen, but maybe she understood it a little better.

"Probably," said Sam, looking up at the tracks, then down over the hill at Constance's grave, reburied and tidy. They could offer her that much, at least. "Unconsecrated ground near the tracks. She probably lived near here."

"Now that we know who and where she is, we could probably find out," said Dean. "If you wanted to know."

"You know, there are probably more bodies around here," said Sam, shaking his head. They'd taken care of her now; they didn't need to dig up more dirt on the poor girl. However she'd died, it wasn't important anymore. "Those people who disappeared, they're going to have to turn up somewhere eventually."

"We can leave an anonymous tip with the police force," said Dean, looking down at her grave like he might spot them laying out on the ground nearby. "It's someone else's problem now."

Sam nodded, but he didn't feel good about it. And that was a problem he'd always had with this job, ever since he was old enough to understand it. Even a happy ending wasn't a happy ending, and even being heroes meant being monsters sometimes.

"I'd appreciate it if we did that," he said, "for closure." For her, and for them too. The fewer loose ends, the better Sam could feel about what they'd done here.

"We can take care of it before we leave town," said Dean. "Are you ready to go?"

"Any time," said Sam, stowing the last of their camping gear. They hadn't gotten much use out of it, but at least Margaret had been able to enjoy a little more comfort and privacy than she would have had otherwise. "Margaret?" He walked over the hill, closer to where he'd last seen her. "Margaret?"

She looked up from where she'd been picking a few flowers at the edge of the trees, paused a moment then nodded at him. She didn't return right away, though. Instead she continued picking flowers until she had a fair-sized bunch in her hands. Sam waited at the top of the hill, breeze catching the tails of his jacket and flapping them against his knees, watching her and making sure she stayed safe.

And so he saw her lay the flowers on the grave of Constance Welch.

The drive back to Jericho station was much quieter and less eventful than the mad midnight ride that had gotten them so distant in the first place. The automobile was not designed for more than two passengers - there was space, but neither bench nor cushion - but they managed with a little creative rearranging, even if Sam feared for Margaret's modesty.

Dean parked them a short distance from the station, where perfectly ordinary people milled about completely unaware of what had transpired all those miles up the tracks. Just as it always was.

"Maybe if you're lucky your brother will already be here waiting for you," said Sam.

"Maybe if _you're_ lucky, he won't be," she said as Sam walked her back up to the station, Dean making another examination of his car for further damage. "Spending the night in the woods with two strange men is not a story I want him to hear while said strange men are still in the vicinity."

"You may have a point," said Sam. They walked the length of the station, but no one came running to greet her. It was possible her brother had gone to the hotel, but Sam knew if it were _his_ sister he wouldn't have taken the chance of missing her.

"Well, even under the circumstances, I'm glad I met you, Miss... you know, I'm afraid I never even got your last name," said Sam apologetically. "Apparently the excitement of a locomotive chase makes me lose all sense of manners."

"Masters," she told him. "Margaret Masters, but I think after everything you've earned the right call me Meg, Sam. And I can't say I'm sorry you had your mind on other things, if it meant I stayed alive to apologize to."

"Well, Miss Masters, since your brother seems not to have arrived yet, can I escort you anywhere?"

"Thank you, but I think I'd prefer to retire to my room until the next train is due," she said. "Perhaps my brother will at last be on that one."

"Are you sure you'll be all right on your own?"

"I'll be fine, Sam," she insisted. "Thank your brother for me, would you? I'll likely not see him again."

"I will," he said, and gave a weak wave as she stepped down the station steps and around the back, heading for the hotel.

Dean seemed pretty anxious to be on the road again for someone whose idea this hunt had been in the first place so Sam waited only long enough to see her off. It was likely Dean was making an effort to avoid a run-in with the men he'd been playing cards with the night before last, and Sam was certainly willing to aid him in that endeavor. Fairly or not - and Sam would not speculate which it was - people rarely cared to lose their hard-earned cash.

When Meg Masters disappeared from sight Sam headed in the other direction, back to Dean and Tessa and back to a long trip home.

 

_Palo Alto, California_

"You could leave all this behind, Sam," said Dean, parking the automobile just outside Sam's boarding house but laying a hand on his arm to keep Sam from leaving just yet. "What's this college education getting you, anyway? Is this really the life you want to live? Forever?"

"What's so bad about that?" said Sam. "It's better than racing locomotives in the middle of the night and digging graves at dawn."

"We saved someone's life today, Sam," said Dean. "What else do you do that can compare to that? And Dad might not've been in Jericho but he's out there somewhere, we just don't know where."

"That's right, we don't know," said Sam. "He could be anywhere. Dean, I think you need to accept that this isn't different than any other time Dad's been missing. He's done it before and he'll probably do it again."

"He missed a rendezvous."

"Is it really the first time?" said Sam, knowing the answer to his own question before he asked it. "That's the nature of hunting, Dean."

"Don't you tell _me_ about the nature of hunting," said Dean. "Don't you dare, Sammy."

"He chose to leave, Dean," said Sam. "And if he wanted us - if he wanted _you_ to know where, he would've told you."

"Choosing to leave doesn't mean he doesn't want us to follow," said Dean, clinging tenaciously to the 'us'. "We make a good team, Sam."

"I know we do." The time apart had changed them both, but not so much that they didn't fit back together again, like timeworn pieces of a jigsaw puzzle, their edges worn smooth against one another. "But I'm where I need to be right now, Dean."

Dean sighed heavily, but he'd already brought out his big guns, and Sam had faced them down.

"Then go."

Sam got out of the vehicle but Dean stayed where he was, steadfastly behind the wheel, prepared for another night-long drive. "Just go, Sammy. Do what you need to do. But I'm going after Dad."

Sam couldn't stop him, and wouldn't have wanted to even if he could. He couldn't deny that there was a part of him that wanted to get right back in that automobile and go with him, rediscovering the brotherhood they'd once shared. But inside the door to that boarding house was a life he'd worked hard for, and a woman he loved more deeply than he'd ever confessed, and those things compelled him too.

"Write me, Dean," he said. "Don't lose touch again."

"Sure, Sam, whatever you say," said Dean, and drove away even before Sam had fully turned to go inside. But he didn't go far, instead lingering inside the running vehicle a short distance away, even if neither of them made any further gesture to acknowledge the other.

The gaslight flickered as Sam stepped inside, an open window fluttering a curtain even though he hadn't felt a breeze outside. He closed it, though not before looking outside, just in case Dean was still lingering. He couldn't tell, though; even open, the window didn't offer him the range of vision he'd need.

He could have sworn, as he headed for the bedroom, that the curtains fluttered again though the window was firmly closed.

There was a small part of him that expected Jessica to be there waiting for him, even though it was late, even though she surely had an early class and no reason to believe he'd be home tonight, but he was still disappointed that there was no sign of her. The bedroom window too was not just unlatched, as it nearly always was, but open, and he told himself to remember to speak with her about that tomorrow. She was welcome in his home any time, but that didn't mean he invited the rest of the university along with any passers-by as well.

The lamp in here too flickered as Sam stretched out across his bed, suddenly feeling the exhaustion from the trip finally settle in. It was a well-remembered exhaustion, though, the remnant of a job as well done as could be expected. He could have fallen asleep right at that moment, fully clothed, but he knew he would regret it come morning if he didn't at least wash up a little, so he yawned and stretched out as long as he would go and opened his eyes again.

To see he wasn't alone in the room after all.

"Holy Sweet Jesus," he said, scrambling backwards over the bed, unable to take his eyes off the horrific sight of his Jessica pinned to the ceiling overhead, as lifeless as a department store mannequin. He would never forget the sight, nor what her eyes looked like with all light gone from them, even though he only stared into them for a moment before fire erupted from her belly and engulfed the whole ceiling.

"Sam!"

Sam scuttled back onto the floor, still staring, unable to look away even though the light and the heat burned his eyes.

"Sam!"

A glimpse of his brother emerging from the smoke and reaching for him was the last clear memory Sam retained before he found himself outside of the boarding house and a safe distance away, straining to get back inside again.

Dean held him tight in his arms as the fire brigade arrived, aiming the hydraulic arms of their wagons to fly bladders of water up atop the building to spill them over the worst of the flames, their pressure hoses tapping into the water main to keep the flames from consuming the nearby buildings.

"We could've gotten her out, Dean."

"Sam, she was already dead." Sam squirmed violently in his arms again, every part of him telling him to get back inside, to try again. "She was _dead_ , Sam. She was dead just like Mom."

"What?" said Sam, given one last token fight against Dean's tight grasp. "Dean?"

"I saw it, Sam. I might've been just four years old but I know what I saw, and when Mom died it looked exactly like that. Whatever got Mom got Jess too."

"Then where the hell is Dad when we need him?" said Sam. "Where the hell _is_ he?"

"I wish I knew, Sam," said Dean, and held him even tighter as, one by one, the flames were slowly extinguished.

: : :

Sam let Dean take care of everything for the first few hours, hours he spent staring at the dying fire, first when it was still burning in front of him and later replaying that scene over and over again in his head. Dean found them a place to stay, which had to have burned through a fair amount of his poker money, and spoke with the fire brigade and police department on his behalf, not to mention his increasingly irate landlady.

She probably thought he'd been responsible for the fire. Sam couldn't even look her in the eye, since he worried she might be right.

It was as though he was wandering through a nightmare that first night, going where Dean told him, sleeping when Dean told him, watching things happen around him that he didn't seem to be able to control. Then when the next day arrived he bypassed sadness entirely and went straight to _anger_. Dean took the brunt of all of it, Sam's shouts, his accusations, even catching his fist once when it went flying towards the mirror of their rented room.

After that, Sam began to actually cope. And Plan.

They were barred from the wreckage, a shell of a house, but Sam sneaked in nonetheless through a charred window frame that had once been the window Jess used. There was little left of his things, and little worth salvaging save a single coat with minimal damage from the ash. Of Jess's things he saved only the pieces of her latest device that she'd never managed to finish creating. Sam wrapped them in his coat, retrieved his knives and a few long-treasured mementos from an undamaged, secret compartment in his closet, and sneaked back out the window again.

The rest could burn for all he cared now. None of it mattered anymore.

He'd left the hunting life, and that life had come back looking for him anyway, with a vengeance. If the supernatural was going to hunt him, then Sam was going to hunt it right back.

He bought himself a used carpet bag with Dean's poker money - as little of it as he could manage - and put all of his things inside in preparation for what he knew was coming. Everything he owned in the world filled only half.

"We don't have to wait for the funeral," said Dean, eyeing the bag as he set another wad of cash down on top of their dresser. No matter where he was or what he was doing, Dean could always find a card game.

"I do," said Sam, even though the very idea had been eating at him ever since Jess's father had arrived in town from Los Angeles. He'd been so kind, and Sam's guilt over Jessica's death only grew. He hadn't been the one to kill her, yet.... "I need to attend. And then after that it's finally done."

"No one would blame you if you didn't--"

"I need to go," said Sam again. There was no room for argument on this point. Little else mattered anymore but going out and doing all those things he'd rejected for the past three years, but being there for Jessica's final moments on this earth was not negotiable.

"All right, then we'll go," said Dean, his words also sounding non-negotiable. If Sam was doing this, he wasn't doing it alone. "What else do you need, Sam?"

"I don't need anything."

"You keep saying that," said Dean, "and somehow I don't believe you. Is it that you don't want anything from _me_?"

"It's that I don't know how to answer, Dean! Dad's missing, Jessica's dead, and I don't even know...." There was no way to adequately finish that sentence. Sometimes Sam wasn't sure he knew anything about anything anymore.

"Well, there's one sure way to pick up his trail," said Dean, "and that's to pick up where he left off."

"Where the monsters go, so do we."

: : :

The letter arrived the day after the funeral, delivered to Sam's hotel room by a tight-lipped landlady who also presented him with an eviction notice. Evicted from _what_ , Sam wasn't even sure.

"What's the matter with her?" said Dean. "You didn't start the fire."

"No," said Sam, who on some level had been expecting this to happen, "but I did have Jessica in my rooms after curfew, which was a blatant violation of my contract. She always did think Jess was too brazen, but now she thinks it appropriate to imply I stole her virtue as well." He crumpled the notice in his hand. "They can't just let her rest in peace."

"Well you did, didn't you?"

"There was no stealing involved," said Sam, tight-lipped. "You wouldn't understand." The eviction notice given the attention it deserved, he turned his to the letter, turning it over in his hands and looking for evidence of who it had come from. "Dean, this is addressed to both of us."

"What the devil?" said Dean, snatching it out of his hands and staring at the address. Sam could see his expression transform as he looked. "Don't you know this handwriting, Sam?"

"It's been a long time," said Sam, but in saying that betrayed that he did. He knew before he handed it over. "Why would Dad be writing to you here? Why would Dad be writing to you at _all_?"

"Because he knows me," said Dean, "and so he knew that when he missed the rendezvous, this is the first place I would come." Thankfully he avoided the 'I told you so' that could rightfully have accompanied that. He made to break the seal himself, then at the last minute handed it back. "Open it, Sammy."

"My name is Sam," he said, and broke the seal.

 

> Boys, I'm sorry to do things this way but I didn't feel I had a choice. Over twenty years ago your mother was taken from us, and only now do I believe that I know how and who. Dean, you've been my right hand man for years, but this is something I have to do alone. Sam, for all that we've had our differences, I'm sure this is one decision you understand.
> 
> I'll contact you through Bobby Singer when I've succeeded. Don't come after me and don't try to find me, for your own sakes as well as mine.
> 
> JW

 

"Like hell we're not coming after him," said Dean, turning his back on both Sam and the letter and stalking to the window. "This is our fight, too." But both of them knew that other than the past two weeks, there had been no 'us' or 'we' or 'our' in years, except for how the Winchesters would always be an 'us'.

"So we're agreed that Dad is full of shit?"

Dean smiled grimly; Sam could see the expression reflected in the window, in all its bitter glory. "For once, yes, we're agreed," he said. "Dad is full of shit and we're going after him. Besides, if he had a real lead on this thing, he would've been _here_."

"Exactly," said Sam, reading the letter one more time before folding it back up again and clutching it tightly, wrinkling the paper. "Maybe if he'd been here, we could have saved her."

"Sam, I didn't say that," said Dean, his voice tight with what Sam thought was defensiveness. Maybe regret. "It's not his fault any more than it's yours."

Sam just wanted it to be _somebody's fault_ , something he could name, since even after all these years they'd never been able to identify the thing that had haunted them all their lives.

"Can you make out this postmark?" said Sam, stalking over to the window and pushing the letter in Dean's face.

"Nebraska," said Dean after a moment. "The top half is smudged, but that's definitely Nebraska."

"Then we're going to Nebraska," said Sam. "Get your things."

"What things?" said Dean. "I'm ready to go whenever you are, Sam."

"Then get that monstrosity you call a coat," said Sam, "and we'll be on our way."

With Sam's home truly gone and Jess in the ground, there was nothing keeping them in Palo Alto - or, indeed, anywhere - anymore.

 

_Elko, Nevada_

"I will never understand why you felt the need to live on the other side of a damn mountain range."

Dean didn't actually need Sam to explain the symbolism of putting a whole lot of mountains between himself and his real life, though. Even if, in the end, the mountains hadn't been high enough, the town not distant enough. Dean was sorry for Jessica, but he wasn't sorry that Sam was back.

"And I will never understand your aversion to normal modes of transportation," Sam returned, sitting on the ground with his back to the automobile as Dean dug out a fire pit for their dinner.

"Hey, now, there's nothing better on land, sea or air than my Tessa," said Dean. "Didn't she get us through the mountains safe and sound?"

"You drove through a train tunnel, Dean," said Sam. "By what definition of 'safe and sound' does that count?"

"It was that or detour by two whole days!" said Dean. "And since you're here to whine and complain about it, we clearly did make it through to the other side, _safe and sound_."

"I think when I go back again, I'll take an airship if it's all the same to you."

Dean poked his stick at the ground a little harder, letting out a soft grunt as he did. The words didn't come out of the blue, but they still hit him like a fist to the gut.

"So you think you're going back?"

"That's not what I...." started Sam, frowning at him and fussing with the untucked ends of his shirt. "That's not the point, Dean."

"Maybe it's not the point to _you_ ," he said, piling on tinder as soon as the circle was cleared and pulling a match out of his pocket to light it up. He watched the fledgling fire for a long time without saying anything more, letting Sam sit with that until he got what Dean was saying.

"I don't know what's going to happen when we get this thing," he said finally.

"You mean, when we find Dad."

"I'm counting on finding Dad first," said Sam. "And when we do, we're all going after this thing together."

"And after that?"

Sam fell silent again, as did Dean, jabbing the fire with his stick until a trail of sparks shot off into the air. The last of the daylight had vanished, the small fire and a single lantern by the car the only light remaining. Still, Dean had no trouble making out the expression on Sam's face, even if he was filling in some of the shadowed blank spaces from extensive memory.

He threw a tin of beans on the fire once it had built up a few coals and sat back to wait for the familiar pop of it.

"You remember the last time we were here?" he said, breaking the long silence. Sam looked around, at the scrub and the fire and up at the sky, like any one of them could remind him. "Vampires. You were... twelve?"

Anywhere the transcontinental railroad ran, they'd passed by a dozen or more times over the years, sometimes stopping, sometimes just on their way from one point to the next. But here, just outside Elko, they'd been _here_ before. Dean could see the moment Sam finally placed it.

"Whole country's infested with vampires," he said. "How did you even remember that?"

Dean shrugged and didn't answer till the hot beans popped in the can, picking it off again with his stick.

"They almost got you," he said, motioning for Sam to join him, finally, at the fire. "You really don't remember that?"

"There wasn't just one time they almost got me," said Sam, folding himself down onto the ground. Dean could hear his stomach rumble. "Dad liked to use me as bait."

"He knew you could take care of yourself," said Dean, passing him the can, metal fork already jabbed inside. "But this nest, we almost didn't get there in time. That's the last time we ever stopped here."

"That's a great story, Dean," said Sam. "Maybe we should sleep with one eye open."

Dean pinched his mouth closed and refused to say he remembered because of how worried he'd been, that he remembered because he'd almost _lost_ him, lost him more permanently than any school could ever take him. At some point all the vampires began to blend into one another, especially when you kept running across the same nest, regrown and reformed, time and time again. But this had been different.

"Nah, me and Dad finally cleaned them out last year," he said when he felt he could keep his voice light again. "They'd set up south of here, this little mining town. It wasn't pretty."

"Never is," said Sam.

Maybe the vampires weren't familiar, maybe they'd never given Sam nightmares like they had Dean, but this kind of moment, passing a can of beans back and forth, Dad gone off on a hunt and Sam and Dean left to their own devices, he hoped this kind of moment was something Sam remembered.

If it wasn't, Dean didn't want to know about it.

"We shouldn't have stopped here," Dean said when they were almost done eating, just a few left in the bottom that Dean had always saved for Sam. This time, Sam gave them back. "I keep thinking about how I almost lost you."

"I was twelve."

"You were my responsibility," said Dean. "You could've been five or twenty-two, it wouldn't have made any difference."

"No, not twenty-two. I'm not your responsibility anymore."

"You're always be my responsibility, Sammy," said Dean, leaving no room for argument. Sam could try till he was blue in the face, but the fact that Sam was his responsibility was an incontrovertible truth. It always would be.

 

_Rock Springs, Wyoming_

Tessa broke down for the first time when they were cutting through a field towards a stone tractor bridge that Dean insisted would be strong enough to hold them, otherwise they were going to detour into town to find the next bridge that wasn't for foot traffic and neither one of them wanted that.

"God damn," said Dean, giving her retractable roof a little pound with his fist, just a tap really. Not enough to hurt his baby when she was obviously already hurting. "I'm going to need a hand with this, Sammy."

"That's a terrible idea," he said. "I don't know anything about mechanics. You'd be better off asking those cattle for help than asking me."

"If they had opposable thumbs I would," said Dean, "but apparently you're all I've got, Sam, and the whole process is going to go a lot faster if you can hold the lantern for me."

"Okay," said Sam, as Tessa rolled to a gentle stop about thirty feet from the stream. "Jess always has me hold her light when she's working. She says mounting it doesn't give her enough flexibility, but I think she just likes to tell me what to do."

"That sounds like something I'd see in a seedy kinetoscope parlor," said Dean. "Actually, that sounds like something I _have_ see--" Sam didn't have to stop him with a look; Dean had the good sense to stop himself. "What did she do?"

Sam hmm'd and got out of the steamer, looking it over as if he was capable of telling anything beyond what color it was. Sam had always been clever, but mechanical ability was a lot more in Dean's wheelhouse than his.

"She makes mathematical and astronomical devices," he said finally. "They're amazing, like art. The last thing she was working on, I... I kept--"

"I know," said Dean. "I saw it. No idea what it is, but I saw it."

"Well, if you have no idea what it is, it's a safe bet I won't," said Sam. "She always works in my rooms instead of hers, says it keeps her nosy neighbors out of her business."

"She sounds like she was pretty amazing," said Dean as he flung open a hatch over the boiler.

"Yeah, she's-- she was just about the smartest person I know," said Sam, swallowing hard over the words. "It's weird to think she'll never finish it."

Dean fell silent then, pushing his hand into the guts of his beauty and pulling at a few things with a soft grunt. Bolts were tight where they should have been and that valve looked just right, but the hose over on the left... yep, that was their problem right there. His road steamer was a lot more straightforward to fix than his brother.

"Get the lantern out, Sammy," he said, pulling out a grease-stained hand and wiping it on his denim waist coveralls. "I think the accident jarred a few things loose that didn't work their way apart till now."

"Can you fix it?"

"Can I fix it, he says," Dean muttered to himself as Sam opened up the hatch to the storage compartment. "Tessa could fall in half right here and I could still fix her. Not that she's going to do that, are you, baby?"

"Your love for your automobile is unnatural," said Sam, taking his sweet time bringing up the light.

"Dean?"

"What's the hold-up, Sammy?"

"Where did this come from?" said Sam, hefting a silver candlestick in his hand.

Well, he was bound to spot them sooner or later.

"What, did you think I wouldn't lift your landlady's silver before we left town?" said Dean. "She was an old bat, Sam. It's not like you were ever going back anyway."

"You stole Mrs. Harrison's silver?"

"Every scrap of it I could get my hands on," said Dean proudly. "Those candlesticks were ugly as sin anyway. We'll be doing her a favor, melting them down."

"I doubt she'd see it that way," said Sam, but Mrs. Harrison was hundreds of miles behind them now, and frankly Sam didn't look particularly remorseful anyway. "Any of it worth saving to sell?"

"Nah," said Dean. "I'm low on silver bullets and you could use a new silver knife, just in case. We're bound to pass through werewolf territory sooner or later."

Sam nodded, just at the corner of Dean's vision as the light streamed into the inner workings of the automobile and he reattached a stray hose, tightening a few other things on his way through his thorough inspection.

"That should do it," he said finally, wiping his hands on his trousers again in lieu of a good rag. "Might as well stay here the night, though, as long as we're stopped. Seems like as good a place as any. I'll give her one more look-over in the morning."

"Sure," said Sam, extinguishing the lantern now that Dean wasn't exploring the depths of his prize creation. Dean closed the hatch but Sam was still standing there, staring at the top of the automobile but looking as though he wasn't even seeing it.

"What is it?" he said.

Sam didn't say anything, but a moment later he did, from the inside pocket of his frock coat, pull out an iron button, a pentacle and a ladies' silver hatpin.

"Just in case," he said.

Dean didn't question the sudden lump he felt in his throat, but he didn't own up to it either. Maybe Sam didn't walk the halls of Stanford armed, but neither was he so far from his roots that he was unprotected.

"Good," said Dean after a long pause. "I... good."

Sam nodded and put all three items back where they'd come from, and Dean wondered without ever asking whether or not the hatpin had belonged to Jess.

"Your turn to set up the tent," he added after another few moments had passed. Awkward, silent moments. "I'm going to go check out that bridge."

When he returned the tent had been erected and Sam was hunched over the letter from their father, having managed to pilfer a magnifying lens among Dean's scattered things. He scrawled a few things down in a notebook in his lap, and when Dean got close enough to look over his shoulder he saw that Sam had managed to decipher most of the rest of the postmark. With just a few letters missing, surely between the two of them and Dean's trusty map they could figure out just where they were headed.

The night passed more comfortably after that, Dean telling Sam about a couple of girls he met out in Boston and Sam telling Dean a little bit about his life at Stanford, before they hit the sack sometime before the middle of the night in order to get an early start the next day.

At dawn, before Sam woke up, Dean crawled out of the tent and made doubly sure that Tessa was in flawless working order. There were still a couple of scratches from the incident with the railway sign, but he could live with those until he had a proper workshop to fix them in.

After that he filled a couple of water bottles from the stream and then stood with his back against his car as he watched a hot air balloon pass overhead. He couldn't see it well enough to clearly make out the occupants, but at one point he was sure he saw one of them lean over the basket and wave down to him. He waved back anyway, even if they hadn't. No harm in that.

"Come on, sleepyhead," he said when Sam finally emerged from the tent, shirt and underpants rumpled and hair standing every which way. "Put your trousers on and let's get on the road. We've still got a hell of a drive ahead of us."

 

_Broken Bow, Nebraska_

"Well, this is it," said Dean. "This is where his letter came from."

As Dean surveyed the dusty town, it surveyed him right back, so much like so many others he'd been in over the years he could almost recognize the faces staring in his direction.

"We should start with the post office, then," said Sam, as heads turned towards them.

Dean was used to people looking at him. He could blend in when he wanted to, but for all he grew up riding through these very towns, when he strapped on his coat and stood next to Tessa, he really did look like an airship captain come down from the sky. And Sam... he might've gone back to his familiar mining trousers and linen shirts, but the frock coat he refused to part with was pure city.

And people always stared at the magnificence of Tessa.

"If he was working this town, the post office is somewhere he only went once. The _saloon_ , however...."

" _If_ he was in town," said Sam. "The only thing we know for certain that he did from here was mail a letter, and even that could've been done by somebody else."

"The letter came from here," said Dean, his eyes moving slowly from one side of the main street to the other, getting the lay of the land. "That means somebody knows something."

"Well, we have to start somewhere." Placing his hat on his head and buttoning his coat Sam started on ahead, long strides eating up the distance between one side of the road and the other in no time. Dean refused to scurry along behind, and his swagger was one thing people _didn't_ think was notable about a stranger in town.

John Winchester looked sufficiently like a whole lot of other men roaming the continent that the post office attendant couldn't be sure whether he'd ever been in or not, even after he perched his rectangular glasses on his nose and took a closer look at the photograph. It was ten years old anyway, and John Winchester was beginning to show his years in the gray in his beard, the lines around his eyes.

The barkeep at the saloon was at least able to tell them that he thought there might've been someone who looked a little like that in town a while back, but he couldn't confirm it to anyone's satisfaction but his own.

"If anyone ever came looking for _us_ , people would remember we'd been in town," muttered Dean, getting them both a beer and sitting down in a back corner.

"Didn't that almost get you arrested once?"

"What do you mean once?" said Dean, trading Sam his beer for the newspaper he'd acquired on their way up the street. "All right, let's check the usual sources."

"If he was here, he was here over a month ago," said Sam. "This week's newspaper isn't going to do us any good. We don't even know if he was here for a hunt."

"When does Dad ever do anything that's not for a hunt?" said Dean, opening the paper and scanning the headlines. "You never know what you might find. If it was something recurring, there might still be some sign of it. If not... well, we know how to talk to people."

"Wow, a two-headed cow," said Sam, taking the paper back right out of his hands. "Now there's something you don't see every day."

"And thank God for that," said Dean, "but I'm pretty sure that's not what Dad was here about, unless there's been a rash of mutant animals. Uh, there hasn't, has there?"

"We could ask, I suppose," said Sam, flipping the page and crackling the paper to get it to stand up straight. "Oh look, you could get your guns cleaned for half price."

"What self-respecting man doesn't clean his own guns?" scoffed Dean. "They wouldn't even know what to do with mine if I gave them a diagram and step-by-step instructions. Give me the paper back, Sam. Do you even remember what you're looking for?"

"Hey, hey wait," said Sam. "Wait, I think I might have something. A missing person."

"Unless it's Dad, I'm not interested," said Dean. "Probably just an obligatory piece about some rich man's son who wandered off to seek his fortune. Those are the only ones the papers ever write about. Nothing weird about it."

"No, hey, listen to me, Dean. He's the fourth person to go missing on the same piece of land in the past four months. All of them were expected back."

"Wild animals, probably," said Dean, but that definitely sounded like something more in their territory, and he peered at the paper over Sam's thumb. "What else does it say?"

"That no one could find any traces of any kind of attack in the general area," said Sam. "You think this might've been what Dad was hunting?"

"Couldn't hurt to find out," said Dean. "It's the best lead we've got, unless the last couple pages of the paper give us a detailed map to the nearest ghost."

More likely the back of the paper gave directions to the nearest brothel, but while in another time and place Dean might've checked it out, they had business to look into.

"Well, then let's hit the newspaper office next and find out everything we can."

The publisher of the local paper, an older gentleman by the name of Blythe, was forthcoming with the name of the latest missing man's next of kin, though he had little else to offer. Certainly he hadn't held back any morsels of information from the story he'd published in his paper.

"Mrs. Mary Collins, widow," said Dean, studying the scrap of paper in his hands.

"Well, he's not necessarily dead," said Sam.

"No, not _his_ widow, his brother-in-law's widow. His sister. I do well with widows."

"I'll just bet you do," said Sam. "Is that a subtle hint to let you handle this one?"

"I didn't think I was being subtle," said Dean. "Do I look all right?"

"You look like you might whip out a revolver at any moment and hold her up," said Sam. "Don't you have any respectable clothes?"

"Sorry, my laundress is on vacation," said Dean, taking off his easily identifiable leather coat and straightening his shirt. "Better?"

"Informal, but acceptable," said Sam, fixing his collar for him. If he tried to suggest a bowtie, Dean was going to tell him just where he could tie it. "Remember you're not trying to woo her, Dean."

"When you're dealing with widows, the technique is the same," said Dean. "All widows want to feel desirable." Then he fixed his hair and headed straight for her house.

Mrs. Mary Collins was a battleaxe of a woman, looking both of them up and down with overt skepticism.

"And how do I know the two of you aren't the ones responsible for his disappearance in the first place?" she said. "Strangers don't usually show an interest."

"We’re not exactly strangers, ma'am," said Sam, taking over when Dean was firmly shut down. "Well, we _are_ strangers to the area, but we do have a personal interest in the situation. We had a family member go missing recently and the last place he was seen was here. Any help you could give us...."

Even battleaxes softened, under the right pressure.

"Matthew was a careful man," she said. "He knew this area, he wouldn't have gone out there unarmed, and he wouldn't have walked away from his home. Something happened to him."

"With your help, we'd like to find out what that was," said Sam, "before anyone else goes missing."

"I don't know what you expect I can do to help you," she said. "I can't tell you where he was any better than Mr. Blythe. Following game takes you all over."

"He was hunting?" said Dean.

Apparently Mary Collins' attitude towards _him_ hadn't softened quite so much. "What else would anybody be doing up there?" she said. "Bird watching?"

Well, it wasn't completely unheard of that someone would be bird watching, but Dean bit back the response anyway. "Is there anyone we could talk to that would know that land well enough to tell us where hunters would mostly likely go?"

"Anyone who hunts up there," she said, addressing her answer to Sam. "You could talk to Mazanahoton. His family's been here longer than any of ours."

"Do you happen to know where we could find him?"

She shrugged. "Playing cards?" she said. "It's that time of day, and that time of year."

"Okay," said Dean, "this is definitely my show now. Thank you for your time, ma'am."

At least she wasn't outright glaring at him anymore, even if her own good-bye was directed towards only Sam as well.

: : :

Dean was itching to get in on the game, getting a sense of the players within five minutes of sitting down with his whiskey. But as easy as it would've been to clean them out - all of them, probably; these were no professionals - he needed these people to be friendly with him for at least the next couple of days. He could wait that long, maybe sit down at the table before the left town and get a bundle of cash to carry them through to wherever this trail took them next.

He caught one of the names of the men playing as Oyatetawa, and another as Thomas, which left two possibilities at the card table. Considering one of the remaining men was a red-haired, burly Scot, Dean considered it a fairly safe bet that the remaining man was the one they were looking for.

While Sam chatted with the barmaid - now there was a sight Dean wasn't at all accustomed to - he bided his time at the bar and waited for the game to amiably break up. Though it still killed him to think how much he could've made off with at the table.

He gave the man a nod as he leaned on the bar and got a fresh drink. "You wouldn't happen to be, uh, Mazanahoton, would you?"

His eyebrow twitched, but he gave no more sign of recognition than that. "Who's asking," he said, wrapping his hand around his beer and drinking half of it in one pull.

"Mary Collins sent us in your direction," he said, nodding towards Sam and his lady friend. "I'm Dean and that over there is my brother Sam."

He gave Sam a long look, then nodded his head. "The widow Collins sent you, did she?" he said. "Well then I'd better give you the time of day." He looked back at the dispersed card game, then at the grimy window, and chose to lead Dean closer to the sunlight. "People in town call me Mac."

"She said you could give us an idea where her brother might have been before he went missing."

"You knew Matty?"

"Well, no," said Dean, "but we have a vested interest in the case."

He narrowed his eyes and seemed to be looking _through_ Dean for a moment before nodding his head again. "Seems like a lot of people have a vested interest in the area lately. You're the second fellow to ask about it."

Dean's attention was definitely caught. "Do you happen to remember anything about the other fellow?" Mac's eyes narrowed suspiciously. "We lost touch with a colleague of ours a while back. It'd be good to catch up."

"Doubt this was him," said Mac. "This was a young fellow. Couldn't have been older than fifteen if you ask me. Name of Joe."

"Nah, you're right, couldn’t be him," said Dean quickly, though he filed the name away for future reference. "Too bad, though. So Mary--"

"Mrs. Collins, if you don't mind."

"--Mrs. Collins told us no one is more familiar with that land than you are."

"Except my ancestors, and you're not in a position to call on them for assistance."

Technically Dean could probably find a way, but that was a whole can of worms he did _not_ want to open. "All we need is a place to start. We can take it from there."

"There's an old scouting trail that runs through that piece of land," he said, drawing a meandering line on the table with his fingertip. "Older than you or I. Older than my grandparents' grandparents. Some folks like to hunt there, but my people don't follow that trail anymore. It has a bad reputation."

"What does that mean, a bad reputation?"

"It means exactly what it sounds like it means," he said. "Something went wrong there, and we leave it to everyone else now. If they want to take land, they can have that piece."

"That might be just what we're looking for."

"Yes, I thought it might be," he said. "If you and your brother meet me here tomorrow at first light I'll take you up to the trail. From there you'll be on your own."

"Thank you," said Dean, offering his hand. "We just want to know what's happening up there."

"I think you want more than that," he said, "but that's your own business. I wish you luck and safe travel, whatever it is."

They shook on that, and Dean thought that luck and safe travel were two of the things that Winchesters needed most in life. As he turned back to Sam and his lady friend, though, he saw that Sam was now on the floor with a couple of patrons looking down at him in either pity or contempt.

Dean was across the room before he even had to think about it, squatting down next to his brother. "What did you do to him?"

"Nothing! I didn't do anything!" said the barmaid, looking faintly panicked as she hovered over the two of them. "Is he sick?"

"No, he's not sick," said Dean. He reached for Sam's shoulder but Sam flinched away. "What, did somebody _hit_ him?"

"No!" she insisted. "We were just talking and then suddenly he grabbed his head and he was on the floor. What's the matter with him?"

"I don't know," muttered Dean, as they began to attract unwanted attention. "Sam. Sam. Sammy!" He managed to grab his shoulders this time without Sam shaking him off, and gradually Sam let go of his head and became pliant in Dean's hands. "What the hell, Sammy?"

"Headache," muttered Sam. "Just a sudden headache. I'm all right now."

Dean didn't buy it, but he turned towards the small gathered crowd and repeated his brother's words. "He's got a headache," he told him. "Probably got knocked around too much when I wasn't there to look out for him."

When Sam punched his shoulder for that one, Dean became more convinced he was going to be fine. As, apparently, did the patrons, who slowly began to drift back to their own business.

"You want to tell me what that was _really_ about?" he said when he was reasonably certain they were alone.

"It was just a headache, Dean," he insisted, letting Dean help him to his feet again. "Sometimes they come on like that."

"And then just go away? Just like that?"

"I probably just got a sunbeam in the eye," said Sam. "You don't need to worry."

Dean looked all the way up to the front of the saloon, where light was just barely reaching through those windows, let alone as far away as where Sam had been flirting with the barmaid. A sunbeam. Right.

"Well, while you were busy with your lady friend," he said, sitting Sam down at a table with him, "I got some actual work done."

"My lady friend, as you put it, remembers Dad," said Sam, "so watch where you point that tongue, if you don't mind."

"Wait, really?" said Dean. "What did she tell you? What was he doing here?"

"She didn't know what he was up to, but she said he was only in town for a day, doing some asking around about something or other, before he got word from someone and took off."

"And she really remembers this? She's not just pulling your leg because you're Mr. Tall, Dark and Handsome Stranger?"

"She remembers _him_ , Dean," said Sam. "Look at her, you know she's just his type. He probably spent more time with her than all his contacts combined."

"Well, does she know where he went from here?"

"East, she thinks," said Sam, "but he didn't tell her and she didn't ask, she just saw him take off out that way. It's not much, but at least we know he was doing something here."

"Yeah, and that what he's doing has nothing to do with this goddamn hunt," said Dean, banging his fist lightly on the table, just enough to bounce his half-empty glass. "Who knows if he even knew there was a hunt in town."

" _Is_ it a hunt?"

"Sounds like it could be," said Dean. "Mac says to meet him here tomorrow morning and he'll take us out there. Goddammit, now we have to follow this through instead of heading east after Dad."

"Why?" said Sam. "Why can't we just leave it, Dean? We came to town to try to find Dad, not to track down a hunt."

"Leave it, Sam? How can we leave it when people are going missing?"

"Someone else can take care of it," said Sam. "You have contacts all over the country, Dean, I know you do. Send one of them a message about this place and let's head east after Dad."

"There might already be someone on it," admitted Dean, "but it's some kid named Joe. He's been asking around about the disappearances too. Seems a little _too_ interested, if you know what I mean."

"Like us," said Sam.

"Uh, right, like us," said Dean. "I can track this kid down and check him out, and you can try to find us a direction that's a little less vague than 'east'."

"Do you have any suggestions as to how I do that?" said Sam.

"I don't know, find another barmaid?" said Dean. "Maybe if you have another one of your little fits, someone will come running to nurse you back to health."

"I told you, Dean, it was just a headache," said Sam. "Look at me, am I anything but completely healthy? It's nothing to worry about."

"Whatever you say, Sam," he said dubiously, but in the absence of any other evidence, Dean had to take him at his word. After three years of separation, there really was a lot he needed to relearn about his brother.

: : :

They found Joe, or rather Joe found them, in a little saloon at the north end of town, last place to get a drink for miles and miles and miles.

"I hear you're looking for Matthew Johnstone," he said, and damn, Mazanahoton was right. The kid really was still in his teens, baby-soft face and all. His hands, though, those hands knew real work as well as Dean's did.

"We might be," said Dean, arching an eyebrow at him. "I hear a lot of people are looking for Matthew Johnstone."

"Most folks gave up a week ago," he said, inviting himself onto the stool on Dean's other side. Sam slowly slipped his beer and watched, and Dean was finally starting to believe in his gut that Sam had his back again. "He owe you money or something?"

"Or something," said Dean. "So what's your excuse?"

"I think you know," he said, tilting his chin just that little bit upwards so he could look Dean in the eye. "I haven't seen you around here before."

"Well, that's funny, because I've been," said Dean, meeting him gaze for gaze. "Do we need to take this outside?"

"That depends on whether you want to talk about what you're really looking for in front of all these nice people," he said. "Matthew Johnstone wasn't the first."

"Even the newspapers have figured that much out," said Dean, but he was pretty clear on what Joe was saying to him and angled his head towards the door. He could do without being any more a subject of gossip than they were already. "So have you got anything useful?"

"What makes you think I'd tell you if I did?"

"Hey, you came looking for us," said Dean, leading the way out the front door and patting his pockets for a cigarette that wasn't there. "I figure if you want something from us, you'd better have something to offer in return."

"Maybe I'm just interested in why there are suddenly other hunters working in my territory."

"Your territory?" scoffed Dean. "First of all, I've never heard of any hunter having any kind of _territory_. And second, what are you, twelve? There's no way you've been working this area very long, not by yourself."

When Dean was that age he'd been hunting for years all right, but not without his father by his side.

"Longer than you think," said Joe. "Not that it should matter. You were just, what, passing through?"

"Something like that," said Dean warily. "We got our hands on a local paper and put two and two together, figured something was up in these parts. You're not going to challenge us to some kind of turf war now, are you?"

"Not before I know your names," he said. "Then I'll give it some thought."

Yeah, sure he would. "I'm Dean. My brother's Sam," he said succinctly. "And we've been doing this all our lives, so you can stop worrying about our credentials. But hey, if you want this hunt it's all yours. If you know what you're doing."

"I know what I'm doing," he said, just as curtly. "I've been up on the trail already. That _is_ what Mac told you about, right? The old scouting trail? It sounded pretty promising to me, too."

"You find anything?" said Dean, trying not to betray _too_ much interest.

"Why do you care? You just handed the hunt off to me," he said. "Have better things to do, have you?"

"Feisty thing, aren't you?" said Dean, grinning at him. "All right, now that we know we're not going to rumble in the street, why don't we have a drink inside? You can tell me what you've found up there, and I can tell you what my brother and I have come up with so far."

He looked skeptical, but he nodded his head. "If you've found anything I don't already have," he had to add, though. "Which I doubt."

"Nice," said Dean, holding the door open behind him this time, and he had to admit, he kind of liked the guy in spite of himself.

: : :

They hired a couple of horses from the hotel and left Tessa parked around the back before leaving to meet Mazanahoton at the saloon. "Anyone who touches her is going to get a nasty surprise," muttered Dean, giving her a pat good-bye.

"Really, Dean, you're far too attached," said Sam. "It's just a motor car."

"Tessa isn't _just_ anything, and don't you forget it," said Dean. "How many times does she have to save your ass before you treat her like one of the family?"

"For someone who hates automatons, I find your anthropomorphization of your vehicle both baffling and unsettling," said Sam, pushing his tails aside as he sat perched atop his horse.

"Ignore him baby, he just doesn't understand," said Dean, right before mounting. "We need to get you a new coat, Sam."

"Says the man who thinks operating his motor car makes him equal to an aeronaut," said Sam. "Thank you, but they'll be peeling this coat off my corpse if I have my way."

"How about we avoid turning you into a corpse in the first place?"

Dean wasn't the least bit surprised to find Joe waiting there by the saloon, saddled up and ready to head out with them. Hell, after a his fifth whiskey, Dean had practically invited him.

"Sam, this is--"

"You introduced him last night," Sam reminded him. "Under somewhat different circumstances."

"Right," said Dean, who certainly hadn't had enough to drink to not remember his actions, or be affected by it the following morning. Just enough to be... enthusiastic. "Of course."

"Sun's already rising," said Mazanahoton, glancing up at the sky. "We should be on our way."

Dean was as comfortable in the saddle as he was behind the wheel of his car, but he had to admit after they'd been riding a while that he might have gotten a little out of practice over the past few months, once he wasn't regularly hunting by his father's side. John Winchester swore by his horse, and as far as he was concerned, if a weapon couldn't be carried and fired easily on horseback, it wasn't a weapon worth having. Once Dean built Tessa, well, he'd formed his own opinions on the subject.

The fields quickly gave way to forest, which gave way to a kind of dense, hilly land broken up by the occasional clearing, that to all appearances was a hunter's dream.

"I spoke with my father yesterday, about your visit here," said Mazanahoton, pulling his horse up short as they reached the base of a hill, "and he told me a story. I'd like to tell it to you now."

All three of them knew when to stop, shut up and listen.

"Many, many years ago, when there was a village here, there was a young woman who did her family's washing by the river. She would often go alone, when the rest of the village would be taking care of their own business. One day, she heard a voice nearby, a voice that seemed to be talking about her without acknowledging she was there.

"She though this to be a trick of her ears, from spending some time on her own, so she mentioned it to no one. The next day she heard the voice again, and though it seemed to be having a conversation with someone else, she saw no one and heard no answers to him. On the third day she once again heard the voice speaking of her, in unkind terms, and this time she mentioned the encounter to her father.

"Her father told her that she was being followed by a spirit who had not found his path to the next land, and that she should not return to the spot alone. But the next day she could find no one to accompany her and once again did the washing alone. She found a new spot on the river, but the voice came once again.

"That night she did not return to the village, and when they looked for her in the morning, they found her drowned in the river.

"They moved the village that very day."

"So you think this really happened?" said Sam. "That this isn't just a story."

"Sometimes stories are told as a lesson," said Mazanahoton, "and sometimes stories are told because they are true. I'll say only this: I had never heard of a spirit like that before, and believe it may be one of yours. If your ways can put a spirit like that to rest then I'll do what I can to help, but this is where I leave you."

"Thank you," said Dean, giving him a nod and a quick salute before spurring his horse on up the hill, not wasting a moment of time. An old story couldn't do their job for them, but it sure could help.

Sam was right at his heels, and from the hoof beats behind them he could guess that Joe was right on Sam's. The path wasn't the key in and of itself, then, but it led to what they were looking for. It was too bad Mazanahoton's story couldn't tell them just how _far_ they'd have to go to find it.

Dean had slowed his horse down to practically a walk in an attempt not to tire him too soon before he found, not signs of a village, which he wasn't expecting after all this time - especially a village that could be picked up and moved in a day - but signs of a river.

He came to a full stop and turned right round in a circle to find the source, but Joe beat him to it, motioning for the both of them to follow him down a nearly overgrown side path that quickly widened out near a riverbank.

"All right," said Sam, "so where do we go from here?"

"I guess we look for bodies," said Joe grimly, dismounting and walking his horse up the bank a short while before letting him drink.

"Current's not strong, but if they ended up in the river like the story said, no telling how far down they could've washed in the past few months," said Dean, "and no way of knowing where they started from."

"It's still more than anyone else had when they came out here," said Sam, "and from what I gathered at the saloon, not a lot of people came looking. The men who disappeared were by and large considered to have met with misfortune or gone off of their own free will, until it began to seem like a pattern."

"Still could be all that," said Dean, but he had a feeling in his gut about it now. "I've got an electromagnetograph wired into Tessa. Sure wish I could use it here and now."

"Add it to your list of devices you'll one day produce for us," said Sam, dismounting in turn and leading his hired horse to water. "We should each take a different stretch of river, looking for signs that something might have come before us."

"These are hunting grounds," said Joe. "For normal hunters. Signs of other visitors might not tell us anything."

"It's still better than nothing," said Dean. "If they all did just slip off a ridge and fall in the stream, well, at least we'll know that too."

"But you don't really think that's what it is."

"If I thought that was what it was, Sam and I would've blown off this hunt and skipped town already," said Dean. "I'm heading upstream. You two work it out amongst yourselves where you'll go."

His horse was happy to walk alongside him, occasionally munching at a stray tuft of grass that hadn't already become brittle and dry from the fall cold. He didn't know quite what he was looking for, but he was sure he would know it if he saw it. And if they found nothing, well, they could leave the hunt to Joe and be on their way again in the morning.

At first Dean thought it was Sam, calling him from downriver, a faint voice that seemed to be carried by the wind. But when it came again a few moments later it was clearly one he'd never heard before.

_Oh look, here's a new one. Do you think he'll be fun?_

Dean jerked a look back over his shoulder but no one was there. Not only was no one there, but he'd traveled far enough around a bend that neither Joe nor Sam was in sight anymore.

"Sam!" he called, looking warily to either side of himself as well and hoping the sound carried as far as he needed it to. His horse hadn't spooked yet, but he was too still and when Dean pressed a hand to his flank he seemed to be trembling ever so slightly. "Sam!"

"Dean!" he finally heard, and _that_ was Sam's voice, he'd know it anywhere.

"Sam, come upriver!" he called back, and figured that 'hurry' went without saying. Though it was hard to say whether the situation was urgent or just weird. Nonetheless, Dean got his duckfoot scattergun off his horse and let it hang loosely by his side as he tied the horse to the nearest tree.

_He looks like the other one, the one that you liked._

"I don't look like anybody," muttered Dean, his eyes darting downstream, watching for the cavalry to arrive. His hand tensed on the gun, but there was no point in raising it if he had nothing to fire at.

_Or do you like the little one better?_

'The little one' sure as hell wasn't talking about Sam, and unless they were breaking Dean down to the various parts of his anatomy.... "Joe! Keep an ear out!"

 _Now_ Dean's horse was getting skittish, tugging against his lead and skirting round the edge of the tree as far as he could go. The voice was still there but it was quieter now, murmurs that Dean couldn't quite make out.

"Just show yourself!" he said, lifting the gun to waist level.

There was a splash from somewhere downriver, and Dean turned just in time to see Joe's horse skittering into the water, to see Joe begin to slide - or more likely, be pulled - into the water. He still couldn't see anything but he fired anyway, rock salt scattering to the north of the horse and rider. The horse, used to the sound of salt shot, managed not to spook, but Joe was already listing too far to stay on his back even if he was no longer being dragged off.

"Sam!" called Dean again. His brother, on horseback again, was in a position to reach Joe faster, though Joe seemed merely wet and bedraggled but otherwise no worse for wear. Dean kept his scattergun raised, ready for a return visit.

_No, I don't like them either. I don't like them at all._

"Yeah, well we don't like you either," said Dean, still looking at empty air. Couldn't even have the decency to _appear_ for them so Dean could shoot them full of rock salt right and proper.

His horse was still skittering around the tree so, seeing Joe more than well enough to refuse Sam's help out of the water - the stream wasn't overly deep anyway, and the part he'd fallen in not overly rocky - he unhitched him and hopped back in the saddle, ignoring the murmured voices and heading back downstream. After all, there wasn't much doubt anymore that they'd come to the right place.

"You all right?" he said when he reached them.

"God damn fine," muttered Joe, squishing his wet hat to his head without even shaking it out and wading out of the stream away from them. "What the hell was that?"

"That, I would guess, is what we're out here looking for," said Dean, looking downstream at the way the water caught and swirled around the next bend. "What do you want to guess that if a body was drowned in this stretch of river, it floated down right about to there?"

He pointed it out as Joe shook the water out of his trousers and remounted his mare, still dripping down. The stream was wide but it wasn't fast, certainly not fast enough to dislodge much of the debris that collected there.

"You sure you don't want to strip down a little before we move on?" said Sam as Dean listened close to the wind for any sign of the voice. "That water's cold."

"I'm fine," said Joe shortly, and took the lead on the way downstream, thick linen coat clinging to his narrow shoulders.

Sam buttoned the top two buttons of his coat, letting the rest flow down his sides. "What happened, Dean? What did you hear?"

"You didn't hear anything, Sam? No voices?"

"You heard voices?" said Sam. "In your head?"

"No, not in my head," snapped Dean. "There's something here, some kind of spirit, but it's not taking physical form. I didn't see a thing when it tried to pull Joe down off his horse."

"Are we sure it's a spirit?" said Sam. "There are other kinds of water creatures too. Sirens, vodnik, nixies, rusalki, even mermaids."

"Mermaids, Sam? Really?"

"I'm just throwing a few suggestions out there."

"None of those even remotely fit," said Dean. " _Maybe_ some kind of water sprite, but the rock salt dispersed it, Sam, even if I couldn't see it. My money's on vengeful spirit."

_Do you think they're talking about us?_

"Make that vengeful spirits," said Dean. "There's at least two of them. Or one of them with an imaginary friend."

"Are you hearing them again, Dean?" said Sam, looking at him with all due concern.

"Just one," said Dean, looking back over his shoulder warily. "But he's talking to somebody else. I can't hear the responses."

"That's a little... weird," said Sam, as they finally caught up with Joe who was dismounting by the debris pool.

"This is all a little weird," said Dean, hopping down as well and tying his gelding up again. He wasn't walking back to town if he got spooked by anything. "Wow, now that is just a big mess. You seem so gung ho, Joe, you can be the first to poke around in there."

"Afraid of getting a little dirty?" he said, pushing up damp sleeves over thin teenage arms. "Don't have the stomach for the job?"

Dean scowled and pushed up his sleeves and found a big stick with which to prod the edges of the pool, push away the branches and the clumps of autumn debris. Sure, he should've pushed the dirty job on the kid, but who could back down from a challenge like that? Certainly not Dean Winchester.

It didn't take long to find something. Even if it wasn't a _complete_ body. "Yup," he said, withdrawing the stick and wrinkling his nose as it came away with pieces of bloated, rotting flesh on the end. "There's someone here."

"Can you identify him?"

"By the goo on the end of my stick?" said Dean. "No. Maybe If I got my hands on some clothing or personal effects."

_We liked him, but he didn't like to play._

"Play?" said Dean. "That's what you call this? You were playing with him?"

"Dean?"

"I'd look a lot less crazy if you were hearing what I was hearing," said Dean. He was sure the voice wasn't in his head, though, which meant it was probably right by his ear. "I wonder how many more of them are in here?"

"Fouling up the water," said Joe, wrinkling up his nose. But all the same, he got a stick of his own and waded in, beginning his own search. "If the Lord loves me I'll come up with only bones."

"The Lord don't love you _that_ much," said Dean, "unless I've done something to piss him off lately."

"Let me count the ways," muttered Sam, shrugging off his coat and laying it over his saddle, then turning up his clean sleeves. Seriously, Dean needed to start letting Sam take care of his laundering.

_None of them liked to play, but maybe these ones will._

"Head's up," said Dean, dropping his stick and reaching for his scattergun, cocking it one-handed. "I think they're coming in for another go at us."

Joe moved clear of the water, wringing out the hem of his shirt again before reaching for his own sidearm, some kind of salt-scattering sling that Dean was going to have to check out when this was all over.

"Got another body," said Sam, reaching out for some still-intact clothing - skin, if Dean was any judge - to pull it from the water. "Looks like a woman. Sort of."

"The fact that you can even tell bothers me more than this spirit does," said Dean. "Come on out, you cowards! Why don't you talk _to_ me?"

There were splashes at the edge of the water, which Dean at first thought were coming from Sam or Joe or even some pieces of somebody falling back in the water, but there was nothing and no one near them. They were just steady splashes, one after the other, along the edge of the pool in Sam's direction.

Dean raised his gun and fired again at nothing, startling both Sam and Joe but at least dispersing the spirit again.

"Dean!"

"It's not my fault they haven't talked to you yet," said Dean, lowering his gun just long enough to reload from an inside pocket of his coat. "Help me out here, guys, where are we going to find these guys to put an end to them?"

"If Mazanahoton's tale is true, then they've been here for generations," said Sam, "so why have disappearances only been reported for the past few months?"

"Not enough population here to notice or report them earlier?" said Sam. "It's not exactly a bustling metropolis."

"I'd buy that if it was years maybe, but not months," said Dean.

"Resting place was disturbed?" suggested Sam. "That could wake a spirit up again after a long dormancy."

Dean snapped his fingers and started looking up and down the stream, searching for anything that fit the bill. Maybe someone had decided to set up a home here, or some new mining operation nearby. Or--

"There," he said, squinting into the distance, right at the next bend in the river. "Is that a landslide up there?"

"Could be," said Sam, shading his eyes from the mid-day sun, fixing his gaze in the distance where Dean was pointing. "Could very well be."

"Only one way to find out," said Joe. "We can come back and sort out body parts when we've taken care of these spirits. Otherwise one of us is going to be joining them before long."

"They might not all be here, if anyone went into the water downriver from here."

"We'll do what we can," said Dean, "and someone else can pick up where we leave off. Actually, maybe we can leave the body sorting to someone else entirely, if we pick these things off."

He could hope, anyway.

Dean took the lead this time, fording the stream where it was shallowest - carefully, listening for any sign of voices - and staying a safe distance from shore as the horses walked single file up towards what was increasingly clear _was_ a landslide.

_They're going to make us stop playing. What do you think we should do?_

"Okay, I heard _that_ ," said Sam. "That's downright unsettling."

"Now you know what _I_ was going through," said Dean.

"Until either one of you is pulled off your horse and into the stream, I don't think you have a true appreciation of how unsettling they are," said Joe. "Those are felled trees up ahead. Nasty landslide, that. Half the cliff fell away."

"God I hope we don't have to dig," said Dean.

"We always have to dig," said Sam. "It seems to be our lot in life."

"You hear that?" said Dean. "We're going to _dig you up_ , you bastards."

"Dean, is that really necessary?" said Sam. "Never mind that you're taunting them, but you have no idea what happened to put them in this condition in the first place."

"They're drowning people," said Dean. "Do we really need to know more than that? Were you thinking maybe we could reason with them instead of taking care of their corpses?"

"I was thinking perhaps it was unnecessary to call them bastards," said Sam.

_Yes, I like him better too, but not _that_ well. Do you think he'll play?_

"Oh, _hell_ no," Dean answered for him, spurring his horse on a little faster when he felt a cold breeze by his side. It was to no avail, though; a moment later Dean felt a hard yank at his side, a yank he couldn't compensate for, and an invisible form he couldn't locate to fire at this time. "Sam!"

"I got this," said Joe, then a moment later Dean felt the edges of a spray of rock salt against his arm. It wasn't fast enough to keep him from hitting the ground, but it was in plenty of time to keep him from being dragged towards the stream to play. "Sam, keep going to the landslide."

Sam looked back to make sure Dean was all right, then when Dean nodded to him he kept going relentlessly ahead, practically leaping from horseback once he reached it to begin searching the area.

"You all right?" said Joe, offering Dean a hand up. His skin was pale and clammy.

"I'm fine," said Dean, "but you're going to come down with pneumonia if we don't take care of these bastards soon. You're ice cold."

"I'm fine," Joe echoed him, clutching his coat closer to his throat as soon as he let go. "They're nasty, but they're not quick. Better catch up with Sam before they decide he's next, though."

"Oh, but they _like_ Sam," said Dean.

"Yeah, well liking someone seems to mean they want to play with them," said Joe, leaping into the saddle and starting ahead. "And that just can't end well."

The landslide was a mess of dirt and rock and tree and mud, taking over a wide swath of the stream bank. It was hard to know where to even start in all of it. That is, until Sam moved a branch away through sheer force of will from near the top of the slide and whistled them over.

"I'm pretty sure that's an arm," he said, pointing at the ground where a tree had been all but uprooted by the slide. And sure enough, beneath the vast, protruding roots of the tree were the familiar bones of the arm, held together by tattered cloth.

_No, they don't want to play, do they? We'll have to do something about that._

"Over my dead--" began Dean, but apparently that was the idea. He felt his legs yanked out from beneath him, then began the swift slide down the mound of debris on his ass. "Sammy!"

The shot went wide, and Dean was halfway into the water before a second shot rang out, this time releasing him. It was a short respite, though. He was barely back on shore, raising his scattergun, when the voice came again.

_You're right, maybe one of the others will be easier to play with._

"Sam, how are you doing uncovering those bones?"

"There are three bodies here, Dean. It's going to take some time."

" _Three_ bodies?" said Dean, shaking out the cuffs of his trousers. "Just don't miss any pieces of them. I'll try to keep them busy while you take care of it."

_Do you think that means he wants to play?_

"Sure, bring it on," said Dean. "Let's play. Come on and play with me, boys."

"I don't think they're all boys," said Sam. "I think it's... God, Dean, I think there's a man and two little girls here."

"Does that mean I really do have to stop calling them bastards now?" said Dean, not hesitating to fire this time when he felt the slightest cold breeze on his right side. He was going to have to catch his god damn horse later; the thing finally spooked and took off halfway back the way they came.

"How's your ammunition holding up?" said Sam.

"Don't worry about me and keep digging," said Dean.

It came at him from two sides this time, too fast for him to fend off. He fought as hard as he could, but there was nothing to fight against, and small cold hands pulled him into the stream, over some rocks that dragged along his shins but didn't manage to tear the fabric.

"Oh no you don't," he said, holding his gun above water, but there was nothing to fire at except his feet. And even if he hit one, there was still at least one other to contend with now. He fired anyway, and felt a momentary freedom that allowed him to scramble up the stream bank crab-style until someone got hold of his ankle again.

"Hang in there," he heard Sam call down to him.

"I'm trying!" he called back, but slowly and surely he was being dragged under the water. One round left and there was no point in saving it now. It was either hit something or have the shell waterlogged anyway. He fired but only freed one of his ankles, struggling to get a foothold on the slippery stones he was being dragged over.

There was a bang that wasn't a gunshot, not one that Dean had ever heard, then salt was scattering over top of him, over the whole area. It wasn't fun being rained on with salt, but he had to admit that it was effective.

"Thanks," he muttered as he scrambled back. He couldn't even see Joe, but he knew he had to be there somewhere behind him, armed and ready for more.

Dean felt a cold breeze wash over him again, but instead of manhandling this time he saw the form of a man appear in front of him, hazy and indistinct, then watched it ignite as if from an inner fire and vanish. There would be two more following it, hopefully before they got hold of him again, but Dean closed his eyes before he could watch the two girls go too.

"Is it over?" he asked when a few moments passed without any sign of them.

"It's over," said Joe, and when Dean opened his eyes he saw Joe offering him a hand up once again. And once again he took it.

"Sammy?" he called up the embankment. "You okay?"

"Better than you are, from the looks of it," he said, making his slow way back down to the stream bank again. For all that he'd been the only one not dragged into the water, though, he looked as filthy as they did. "I'm glad I removed my frock coat."

"Your coat?" said Dean. "That's what you're worried about, your coat?"

"Once I determined you were fine," clarified Sam. "You seem to be short a horse."

"Yeah, I seem to be, don't I," said Dean grimly. "Well, at least he headed back in the right direction. We need to dredge some more of that pool before we head back, see what we can turn up."

"And doesn't that sound like a pleasant afternoon," said Joe. "Come on, hop on, she can carry two. Just don't hold me."

"I have enough rumors floating around about me, thanks," said Dean, stealing the stirrup to mount the horse behind him. "All right, let's get this done and go home."

: : :

They were all sodden and rank when they met up with Mazanahoton again, camped out by the side of the path where they left him, by a small but blessedly warm fire.

"It's done," said Dean, stripping off his coat and beating strings of dead grass and decaying leaves off the back of it. "They're at rest."

"You found spirits?"

They found more than spirits, as their condition could attest, but Dean just nodded his head. "Three of them," he said. "We think they were killed some time ago and buried beneath a tree by the stream."

"Confused and vengeful spirits," he said, nodding sagely. "My people will reclaim this land now."

"It's pretty nice, when no one's trying to drown you," said Dean, warming and drying himself by the fire. "Did you wait here for us this whole time?"

"It seemed like the right thing to do," he said. "And now I can return to the widow Collins and finally give her news of her brother."

"Wish it was better news," said Dean. "We found... remains. Someone will want to go back and give them a proper burial."

He nodded, apparently already having expected that. "It will be taken care of."

"And I expect the widow Collins will be very grateful."

He saw the ghost of a smile on Mazanahoton's face. "One can hope," he said. "The widow Collins can be an impenetrable woman."

They stayed a little while longer at the fire, drying out clothing and warming themselves for the ride back into town. The sun was beginning to set as they headed out, arriving back just before total darkness descended.

"I'm getting us a room at the hotel," said Sam, and Dean didn't even make a token argument about the expense. They were leaving town; he could make up the money in no time. "We stink, and I want a hot bath."

"Whatever, princess," said Dean, and wondered if he could beat him to it. He looked and smelled like... like he'd been wading in a pool of decaying leaves and bodies, actually.

He settled for scrubbing himself down, though, and putting on clothing that didn't smell like he was the walking dead. Hopefully the laundress was everything the proprietor claimed she was. Not that she was getting anywhere near Dean's coat; he'd take care of babying that himself. Down in the saloon, over a few pints of beer.

He wasn't surprised to find Joe already down there, hat down low over his forehead and glass of whiskey on the table in front of him. Dean raised a glass to him, and when Joe raised one in return he took it as an invitation, sitting down across from him.

"So what are you really doing here?" said Joe without preamble. "And don't tell me you burned across five states just to take care of some penny-ante spirit. Your brother told me you've been driving since California."

"We're looking for someone."

"One of the men who disappeared up on the trail?"

"My father," said Dean succinctly, finger running through a puddle of beer on the tabletop. "He was in town a month ago. We're trying to pick up his trail."

"He one of us?"

"Taught us everything we know," said Dean after a satisfying swallow. About hunting, anyway. A lot of other life and social skills his boys had to learn on their own.

"Except how to track him?"

Dean took another slug of his beer before answering. "Just for that," he said, "you can buy your own drinks."

"I was buying my own drinks anyway," he said. "Is he on the run?"

"No," said Dean, then, "we don't think so, anyway. He's on the trail of something and he's too stubborn to let his sons help. He just didn't count on the fact that we're more stubborn than he is."

"Any luck?" said Joe, slowly sipping his whiskey, swallowing it smooth.

Dean shrugged. "Someone remembers him heading east out of town," he said, finally acknowledging, with posture if not words, how little that gave them to work with.

"I might be able to help you out," he said, sipping again, looking more at the table than at Dean.

"You didn't even know him," said Dean. "How exactly do you think you can help?"

"Maybe I didn't," he said, "but I know a place not all that far southeast of here that a lot of hunters pass through. If you want to find out any information about another hunter, that's the first place _I'd_ go."

"Yeah? Then how come I've never heard about it?"

"Couldn't tell you," said Joe with a shrug. "Maybe you just never met the right people. Maybe you just never asked the right questions."

Yeah, and maybe Joe was just full of it, but Dean wasn't going to discount this possibility. He'd be an idiot to blow off a lead right now. "And you can, uh, tell me how to find this place?"

"It's a saloon, called Harvelle's," he said. "I'm heading there myself now that this job is done. Maybe pick up a lead on something new."

"Hmm," said Dean, and drained his beer. "I'll have to talk to Sam, but do you think we could--"

"Eat my dust all the way down?" he said. "If that mechanical beast of yours is up for it."

"Oh, you have no idea," said Dean, draining the rest of his beer. "So, since you seem to be so familiar with the area, you know of any card games tonight I can get in on?"

A lot of beers and a lot of bills later, and a wave at Sam who came down after his bath looking prim and proper and ready to find his lady friend again, Dean was ready to head back to their room. Though Sam's idea of lady friend meant only lady and friend, and Dean never forgot the haunted look in Sam's eyes whenever Jessica's name arose in conversation.

Joe wasn't a bad hand at cards either, though he left the table with his modest winnings long before Dean did.

Before he left for the night he heard someone say something to Sam about his cocksucker of a brother, and nearly turned back to fight his own battle before deciding it just wasn't worth it. Who cared what they thought, anyway; Sam and Dean would be leaving town in the morning and who knew if they'd ever be back.

: : :

They met at the edge of town, at the side of the road that headed southeast. While waiting, Dean found he couldn't help but take a moment to linger near the shell of a nearby house, burnt right to the ground.

"That looks pretty fresh," he said. "Couple weeks maybe? Poor bastards."

"A month," said Joe, tightening the girth on his mare and giving her flank a fond pat, "more or less. I looked into it when I first got here but there was nothing to it. Probably a cooking fire. The wife died, but the husband and their baby daughter got out all right. They went to Boston to stay with his sister, or so I heard."

"Huh," said Dean, letting a bit of charcoal crumble between his fingers. "I hate fires."

Sam's gaze lingered long after Dean got in the car, but at last he too climbed inside and they followed Joe in the direction of this mysterious hunter gathering place, hoping to find some more answers of his own.

 

_Alma, Nebraska_

It was only a day of travel before they reached the saloon Joe had told them about, quiet and unassuming at the side of the road. If he hadn't described it so clearly for them, they might've passed right by.

Joe'd beaten them there, but not by much, still out in front of the stables giving his horse a treat. He waved them over when they got out of the vehicle, and met them halfway between the stables and the door.

"I'll introduce you," he said, "but then I've got business of my own."

Dean thought he could handle the introduction well enough himself, though, especially since Joe'd told them what to expect. They both followed Joe inside and Dean took a good read of the place before heading straight for the barkeep.

"You must be Ellen," he said with a broad smile reserved for just this sort of occasion.

"Must be," she said, her eyes tracking Joe's progress across the room before landing on Dean. "And you are?"

"I'm Dean and this here is my brother Sam," he said, jerking his thumb behind himself. "We just finished some, uh, work up in Broken Bow with a, uh, a friend of ours."

"Yes, I gathered you met my daughter," said Ellen dryly.

"What? No, we came down with Joe," said Dean, looking over at the boy who'd brought them. The boy who was in the midst of taking off her hat and unpinning her hair.

"That's Jo," she said over her shoulder, letting her long blonde hair fall down her back. "Short for Josephine. Unfortunately."

"Yup, you've met her all right," said Ellen with a resigned sigh. "Can I get you boys anything to drink?"

"Something hard and fast," said Dean, slumping down in his chair and deliberately not looking at Jo. Jesus Christ, he hadn't seen _that_ one coming. And from his enlightened snicker, he was pretty sure Sam hadn't either. "Your daughter, huh?"

"Much as she does everything she can to deny it," she said, serving him up a double shot of whiskey, and another for Sam. "You're not the first man she's driven to drink."

"Doubt I'll be the last," said Dean, finally stealing a glance at him - her - out of the corner of his eye. Other than the hair, Jo looked the same as he had for the past week. "Nice place you've got here. Funny how Dad never brought us here himself. He's been all over; he must've known this place was here."

"Your daddy in the business too?" said Ellen, pouring a matching drink for herself.

"He's the reason we're in town," said Sam. "Dad raised us in the life. Everything we are is thanks to him."

Then he gave Dean a pat on the shoulder, angled his head towards the sign that indicated the saloon mercifully had indoor plumbing, and crossed the room without another word. It wasn't a stretch to think his vanishing act had less to do with his bladder and more to do with their father.

"Not everyone would thank a parent for that," said Ellen, glancing first at Sam's retreat and then at Jo. "What'd you say you last name was?"

"I'm not sure we did," said Dean, downing the drink in one swallow and hissing as it went down. "It's Winchester."

"Winchester?" said Ellen. "Christ Almighty, you're not John Winchester's boys, are you?"

"You knew Dad?" said Dean, pushing his glass forward for Ellen to pour him another shot. "How'd you know him?"

"He used to show up here pretty regular," said Ellen. "He knew my husband Bill."

"Don't suppose I could talk to Bill, could I?" Ellen's expression hardened. "Or not."

"He passed on a few years ago," she said shortly, pouring for him before capping the bottle. "What would you want to talk to him about anyway? The good ol' days?"

"Dad's gone missing, actually," said Dean, studying his glass for a moment this time instead of downing it in one smooth motion. "Trail led us to Nebraska and Nebraska led us here. We were hoping to find someone who knows something."

"Well, all kinds of hunters pass through here," said Ellen. "I can keep an ear out for you boys. You could keep an ear out for yourselves, too."

"Thanks, we will," said Dean, taking a sip. Jo laughed nearby and Dean could feel his shoulders tensing at the familiar yet unfamiliar sound. "Don't suppose you know anyone around here who's letting out rooms? I think Sam'd rather sleep on top of your bar than camp out another night."

"If you're clean and promise me you won't harass my girl, I've got a room," said Ellen, narrowing her eyes at him for a moment. Dean waited. "Well, can you promise me that?"

"I can promise you that," said Dean after a moment. "And Sam, Sam can sure as hell promise you that. Sam could probably give you a vow of celibacy if that's what you were after."

"So you're saying I shouldn’t expect quite so much from you," said Ellen, though there was a particularly little quirk to her lips that suggested that she wouldn't be asking it. "I'll have Jo show you when she and Ash have caught up."

Ash would have to be the fellow she was talking to, long hair and misbuttoned waistcoat and a set of miniature tools poking out of the pocket where a kerchief should have been.

"Her brother?"

"God help me no," said Ellen, "but he might as well be; they've been thick as thieves since the day he showed up here."

"I thought hunters just passed through here," said Dean. "He looks like he stayed."

"I do pick up the occasional stray, in spite of myself," said Ellen. "Ash is a useful sort to have around." She pointed behind herself, to a complicated array of bottles and reservoirs and copper coils looping around to finally end in an array of spigots. "He built my entire dispensing system for me."

"Well, anyone who makes it easier to get liquor in my glass is all right with me," said Dean.

What was also all right was having something to talk about besides the daughter that Dean'd just spent the last few days in pretty close quarters with. He didn't know if it was better or worse, after all of that, to find out that she'd been a girl all along.

Though he suspected Jo would be reluctant to confess as much, outside of the presence of her mother.

"How about one more?" he said, finishing off his second drink with one efficient motion. "And then I can see about finding out what I can. Dad's a pretty slippery man when he wants to be.

"He certainly is," said Ellen, but never did elaborate on that.

: : :

"Do you think he visited often?" said Sam, leaning forward onto his elbows on the table to keep their conversation private. "Without us?"

"I didn't think there was anything he did often without us," said Dean. "Except the obvious things. But Ellen says she knew him pretty well and I don't have any reason to think she's lying."

Ellen'd been friendly enough with them, but not overly warm, and she hadn't asked any kind of favor in return for information. It was a very typical hunter relationship, so far as Dean could tell. Other than the fact that their father had never so much told them about this place, there was nothing to be suspicious of.

"Then maybe we really will pick up his trail if we linger around here long enough," said Sam. "I'll venture a guess that you haven't heard anything yet."

"You'd be the first to know if I heard anything."

Sam nodded and took a sip of his water; he wasn't a teetotaler by any means, but sometimes he made it annoyingly difficult to tell.

"It makes you wonder just what else he didn't tell us, though, doesn't it?" Sam said after a moment. "And I don't mean his infrequent liaisons or hunting trips he didn't want to traumatize his children with."

"You really think there are things out there that Dad just... didn't tell us about?"

"Yes," said Sam without a moment of hesitation. "I do. I always have. But then, I never quite saw him the way you did."

"The way I did? What does that even mean, Sam?"

Sam sighed into his water, wrapping both hands around the tall glass. "You just always had more faith in him than I did," he said, his hands trembling. "He's not infallible and he had secrets. If he didn't, we wouldn't have to be chasing his trail now."

"You're angry, aren't you?"

"What?" said Sam. "Of course I'm angry. I have so many different reasons to be angry, Dean, I don't even know where to start with them. Whenever I needed him, Dean, he wasn't there. And... what happened, back at Stanford, that was just the latest. I shouldn't have to be chasing him, Dean, he should _be_ here."

"He was a fool to think he was doing this without us," agreed Dean, "but whatever he's doing right now, it's for us, Sam."

"No, whatever he's doing now, it's for revenge," said Sam. "And I just want to be doing it with him."

Dean didn't feel like there was anything he could say to that, not when Sam had that particular set to his shoulder, to his jaw. There were some things that Dean never forgot, no matter how much time passed, and most of them had to do with Sam.

"So," Sam went on after a moment. "Jo, huh?"

Dean had hoped for a change of subject, but not _that_ one.

"I don't want to talk about Jo," said Dean. "Or Joe, for that matter."

"They're the same person, though I find it very hard to believe that _you_ , of all people, weren't able to peg her for a girl within five minutes of meeting her."

"And just why would I have any reason to think she was a girl?" said Dean. "I wasn't sniffing around for clues, Sam, I just took him for what he appeared to be."

"Took _her_."

"Well, Joe was introduced to me as a him," said Dean, "and that was no misunderstanding. Don't you have anything to gossip about other than the owner's kid?"

"Fine, if that's the way you want it to be," said Sam. "Just remember that she grew up here. If there's anyone who might have stories about John Winchester and be willing to open up about them, it's probably Jo Harvelle."

"Joe Harvelle doesn't seem the type to be open about anything," said Dean. "You spent any time with that Ash character?"

"No longer than it took to say hello this morning as I was toasting some bread," said Sam. "I guess if he's been here long enough, he might have some tales to tell too."

"He seems like an interesting fellow," said Dean. "A man after my own heart."

"He likes Tessa, doesn't he?"

"He _loves_ Tessa," said Dean, breaking out into a grin. "I'm supposed to give him the grand tour of all her ins and outs this afternoon, and he's going to introduce me to some of the things he's been working on here. Ellen says the guy's a hell of an inventor."

"I'll leave that to you, then?" said Sam, nursing his water. "I think instead I'll take a constitutional this afternoon. I've got a lot on my mind."

"Sam...." said Dean, but there was no way to finish that quiet plea with anything helpful for either of them. Even here, far from home and among strangers from another life, Sam still found things that reminded him all too painfully of his Jess.

: : :

Jo wasn't much different around her mother's saloon that she was the rest of the time. Once in a blue moon Dean would catch her with her hair down, usually while she was combing it, but most of the time she was the Joe he'd met back in Broken Bow. He would never have guessed she even owned a dress, let alone was willing to wear one, until he inadvertently spied her one day.

Now Dean liked to think that most of the time he was a good and honorable man, but he was still a man. When given the opportunity to spy on something he knew he shouldn’t be looking at, the first thing he did was look, and when Jo's door was open a crack when he was just coming out of his own room it was like a sign.

Jo's trousers were on but her thick linen shirt was off and lying wrinkled on the bed, and a tight leather corset-like undergarment was visible binding her breasts to her chest, hiding them rather than supporting them. In a trick of flexibility that Dean himself could never have accomplished, she unlaced the corset herself and slipped it off over her slim hips, rubbing her reddened sides where the tough leather left its imprint on her body.

The trousers came off next, tossed aside with the shirt, and she didn't replace the corset with a boned monstrosity to show off her womanly assets but she also did nothing to mask them. The dress she put on was simple, low cut, and no more suited the Joe Dean knew than it would have Dean himself.

"Do me a favor?" she said. Dean was still and silent for a moment, waiting for someone else to emerge into his line of sight. But Jo just sighed. "I know you're there, Dean. I need your hands for something."

There was nothing to be done but show himself, and try not to let a guilty flush show on his face. "What kind of a favor?" he said. "I can lash, tie and lace nearly anything."

She needed none of those things, though. What she did was hand him a pair of scissors.

"I've been meaning to do this for a long time," she said.

"The hair?" said Dean hesitantly.

"The hair," she confirmed. "I'll wear the dress for today, but I won't be the kind of daughter she wishes she had. I can't."

He'd done this before, quick utilitarian cuts for his family, and he had the feeling that was exactly what Jo wanted. He was silent as he worked, and so was she, not even looking into the hand mirror lying a short distance away as strands of hair fell about her shoulders onto the rain smock that Dean had placed there in lieu of anything more appropriate.

"I hope you were sure," he said finally, standing back and looking at his handiwork, "because I'm done."

It was a little uneven, the way Sam's hair always had been when Dean had cut it for him, but when she finally looked at herself she just nodded her head.

"It's perfect," she said. "I look like everyone else now."

"You could never look like everyone else," said Dean, and hoped she knew that he wasn't talking about the dress. "What’s the occasion?"

"My mother asked," she said, sighing softly at her reflection. "I think she still hopes this'll help me meet a nice young man and that I'll give up on hunting."

"It would be easier," said Dean carefully. "And safer."

"I don't want easy or safe," said Jo sharply. "My father was a hunter and so am I. And even if I wasn't, I would still never be that pretty little girl that lives in her head."

"She must know that," said Dean. "I mean, she _has_ met you, right?"

Jo almost cracked a smile. "Why is this so much easier for everyone else to accept than her?"

"Because expectations are always different when it's your own children," said Dean. "Just ask Sam about that. So now that you're all dolled up, do you want an escort downstairs?"

"Bite your tongue and kiss my ass," said Jo, giving him a hard, but friendly, shove. "I don't need anybody's escort anywhere."

"No, I guess you don't," said Dean, and contented himself with following her down.

: : :

John Winchester's name was not an unfamiliar one in the hunting community. Neither were Sam's and Dean's for that matter. Not that Dean would ever have called it a community, not when the ties between them were so tenuous; just because they shared a vocation didn't mean they shared anything else.

Dean got on well enough with some of them, though. Jo gave him a cursory introduction to a man named Gordon Walker, who'd just come in from clearing out a nest of vampires in Baton Rouge.

"Dean Winchester?" he said. "John's boy?"

"That'd be me," said Dean, the nodded towards his brother, who was deep in conversation with someone at the end of the bar. "That's Sam over there, my little brother."

"I'm not sure little's the word for it," said Gordon, whistling low. "Jo says you might need a hand with a hunt?"

Dean chuckled and shook his head. "Not a hunt, exactly," he said. "We got separated from Dad, and we're trying to track him down. Guy's not exactly making it easy."

"Your father never was one to stay in one place for very long," said Gordon. "Haven't run into him in about a year, though so I'm not sure I'll be much help."

"Well, it was worth a shot," said Dean, wrapping his hand around a glass of whiskey. "He came through this way about a month ago, and sooner or later we're going to run into someone who can give us some good news."

"You sure he hasn't run into something bigger than he can handle?"

"There's nothing too big for John Winchester to handle," said Dean, with the confidence of a boy who'd seen his father tackle his nightmares and win. "And if he's finally run into the thing he can't kill, well, we'd like to know that too."

"Fair enough," said Gordon. "Seems like you're doing just fine on your own anyway. Comes a time when a man needs to start living his own life, separate from his father."

"Dad's got something we want," said Dean shortly, and without any intention of giving any more detail than that. "And I'm pretty sure he knows it."

"That sounds like some family business I've got no intention of sticking my nose into," he said. "Do you want me to tell him you're looking if I run into him on the road out there?"

"Best not to," said Dean a little grimly. "It'll just make him that much harder to find."

"I take it he'll be none too pleased to be found," said Gordon. Dean could hear the suspicion there, but he had a gut feeling Gordon was on his side. "Might want to make your inquiries a bit more discreet then. Word's bound to get back to him."

"That's a chance we'll just have to take," said Dean. "He's... we've got good reason to want to catch up with him."

"I'll take your word for that," said Gordon, "and in the meantime, some more whiskey while you tell me all about this spirit up in Broken Bow? I've been through there a dozen times and I never heard anything about it."

"Oh, I'm telling you about that, am I?" said Dean. "In that case, the whiskey's on you."

: : :

"You look like you're starting to get some cabin fever," said Dean when Sam joined him out by the automobile, where Dean was busy buffing her to a nice shine. The stop, and Ash's well-equipped workshop, had finally given him a chance to tune her up properly and make sure there wasn't so much as a scratch left on her.

"We've been here a few days now and we haven't got anything yet worth stopping for."

"You don't think it was worth just finding out about this place in the first place?" said Dean. "Not to mention the benefits for Tessa here."

"Maybe those are worth it for you," said Sam, "but I'm in this for one thing only and that's to find Dad, and find the thing that keeps hunting our family."

"Well, you weren't going to do that without our ride," said Dean, "and she needed this breather. You really want to get on the road again without anyplace to go?"

"There are other people we can go to," said Sam. "We can stop by Pastor Jim's church; if anyone would know, it would be him. We always used to stop there so Dad could stock up on holy water and other paraphernalia."

"We stopped there because you liked it there and sometimes it was the only way to shut you up," said Dean. "Dad can get holy water anywhere."

Still, it was something to work with. If Dad needed help, Jim Murphy was one of the few people he trusted without question.

"Well, what would you have us do?" said Sam. "Stay here in Ellen's spare room forever?"

"All right," said Dean, tweaking Tessa's right headlamp just so. "But we should stay for Thanksgiving dinner. I promised I'd help with the turkey, and we could both use a good home-cooked meal before we hit the road."

"I can live with that," agreed Sam. "I just think we've gotten all we can out of this place. Or is there another reason you want to stay?"

"And what kind of reason would that be?" said Dean, moving around back to check the valves on the boiler. He had a suspicion he knew what was coming, though.

"Jo," said Sam after a moment. "I think she'd have you, you know."

"Really?" said Dean dryly. "And here I thought you meant Ellen."

"You could _have_ that, Dean," said Sam. "You're twenty-six years old. Have you never wanted what I had with Jessica?"

"And what _did_ you have with Jessica, exactly?" said Dean. "Because you sure as hell weren't married to her."

"You wouldn't understand," said Sam. "It's not about marriage. You'd know that if you'd ever been in love with anyone."

"Yeah, well maybe I'm not looking for that, Sam."

"Is it that you liked her better with the e on her name?" said Sam, softer, speaking into the air beside Dean instead of right to him. "She did make a nice, fresh-faced boy."

"Jesus Christ, Sam, why would you ask me that?"

Sam shrugged but he didn't back down from his insinuation. "People have said things," he said. "You know people have said things, for a long time. You could tell me if it was true."

"No, I couldn't," said Dean. He himself wasn't even sure if that meant he couldn't talk about it, or if it meant he didn't know how to answer the question when it came to Joe Harvelle. "And I'm not interested in courting Jo either way. We haven't got time for that, Sam, even if she'd want something like that. We have a job to do."

"Is that what you're going to say for the rest of your life?"

"Maybe," said Dean tersely. "Maybe not. Either way, this is not the time or the place to even think about that kind of thing. You're right, we should get on the road again before the trail gets even colder."

"Good," said Sam, using the sleeve of his coat to wipe a fingerprint off the polished metal of Tessa's exterior. "And when this is all over, you can always come back."

"Thanksgiving, Sam," Dean interrupted him. "It's just a couple of days. And then when December rolls around, we'll hit the road."

: : :

The saloon was closed to its regular traffic, travelers and hunters and locals just looking for a watering hole. Most everyone was at home today anyway, or had found a home of some sort to be in. For some, that home was Harvelle's Roadhouse.

By this point Dean knew Ellen and Jo and Ash - well enough to feel like he wasn't intruding on the holiday, at any rate - and Gordon and Travis and Olivia were familiar enough faces from their stay at the Roadhouse. But it was when Caleb walked in the door with his pretty new wife Kate that Dean knew their staying through the holiday was the right choice.

"Dean?" he said, brow furrowing as he stared at one brother and then the other. "Sam?"

"Caleb!" said Dean, standing up so quickly he almost knocked his chair over. "Well I'll be damned."

"Now you boys are just about the last people I'd expect to show up at our little gathering. I didn't even know you were passing through this way."

"Well, business, you know how it is," said Dean. "Hey, how's Misty doing? She being good for you?"

"Your girl's got an appetite that could almost equal yours," said Caleb. "Kate's been taking her out sometimes, says she's a dream to ride."

"She always was," said Dean, and couldn't help the bit of nostalgia he felt, remembering the mare who'd been solid for him all that time. "We'll come by when we have a chance. Once our business is taken care of."

"Always figured you would," said Caleb, already giving Sam a once over. "Boy, you got _tall_."

Sam grinned a little sheepishly and hung his head, like he always did when someone pointed that out. "All I ever wanted growing up was to be taller than Dean."

"Well, you certainly did that," said Caleb. "Boy, I wasn't sure I was ever going to see you again. How've you been keeping?"

"Well enough," said Sam, his smile fading only a little. Apparently the news of Jessica hadn't reached Caleb yet, or if it had he had the discretion not to bring it up. He always had been the type not to pry. "Good to be with Dean again."

"Brothers like you shouldn't be separated," agreed Caleb, even though that wasn't what Sam had said. Sometimes words like those were so transparent, anyone could see what was beneath them. "Ellen! You need any help back there?"

"Can always use another set of hands," she called back. "Dean, didn't you promise me you'd take care of this turkey?"

"On my way," he said, and clapped Sam on the shoulder on his way by.

Sam didn't seem unhappy to be here. In fact, he seemed pretty pleased to see Caleb, and maybe remember the good times they spent out on his ranch when they were younger. But Dean couldn't help but wonder what Sam would've been doing if he hadn't lost Jess, if he was still in Palo Alto for the holiday. He wondered if Sam was thinking about that too.

It wasn't just for his own sake, and the fact that sometimes holidays were the only meaningful dates for hunters, that he decided they should put off leaving till after the Thanksgiving meal.

But Sam was smiling and not isolating himself from the gathered hunters, and if he was thinking about Jess, he was remembering the good times.

Dean finally let himself relax into his task, and helped Ellen not only with carving the turkey but with putting everything else together as well. The meal was substantial, and enthusiastic, and was the best one Dean could remember having in a long time.

: : :

"I think we're going to be taking off this afternoon," said Dean, enjoying his breakfast on the bar of the empty saloon while Ellen polished glasses behind it. "Thanks for everything, Ellen. We might not have found what we were looking for, but we found something all the same. I think we both really needed this."

Ellen was quiet for a moment, finishing off with her glass and setting it on its proper shelf behind the bar. "About that," she said. "I think we have something to talk about, Dean."

"You found something out?" said Dean, leaning across the bar and right up in Ellen's face. She pushed him back with one hand to his shoulder.

"Something like that," she said, surveying him for a moment before sighing and reaching back behind the bar. What she pulled out was the very last thing Dean expected to see.

"What... Ellen, where did you get this?"

"Your father left it with me about a month ago."

"What?" he said. "Why the hell didn't you say anything?"

"Because your daddy's bad news, Dean Winchester," she said, sighing again as she handed it over into Dean's greedy hands. "But that doesn't mean you don't deserve to find him. His mission is your mission too, but he's too damn stubborn to admit it."

"You don't know what you're talking about," he said, snatching the journal from her. The worn leather felt familiar in his hands, from all the times his father had handed it over into his keeping over the years. "He never would have left this behind."

"Unless he had a damn good reason to," she agreed with him. "Somehow he knew you'd make it here, sooner or later. This was always for you, and your brother."

He wanted to open the journal right then and there, thumb through it, absorb all those things his father had collected over the years. Maybe find a clue why he'd left it behind. But that was something private, something intimate. He wasn't going to do it here in front of Ellen Harvelle.

"What did he say? What did he say when he gave it to you?"

"To keep it safe," she said. "Exactly what you'd expect John Winchester to say. I don't think he liked leaving it with me, but there weren't a lot of options."

"What is it with that?" he said. "What is it with you and my dad? He's never even mentioned you."

"We have a history," she said curtly. "A history he obviously didn't want to involve his boys in. Maybe one day he'll tell it to you."

Or maybe the answer was in the book he held in his hand, but no matter what her history with his father, Dean felt confident that Ellen hadn't gone snooping in the journal, not if she was half the hunter she seemed to be. A hunter's journal was inviolable.

"Anything else you've been keeping from us?" he said. "He give you his address? Maybe he's got a telephone service taking calls for him now?"

"I had to get a feel for what was going on before I told you anything," she said. "You'd have done the same thing." The fact that he would have done exactly that did not temper Dean's impatience. "He didn't give me an address, or even a place. All he said was that he was going home."

"Home?" said Dean. "What does that mean, home?"

"He's your father," said Ellen. "You figure it out."

Dean had the awful feeling he already knew.

: : :

Dean found her outside at the woodpile, fighting with Ash's half-finished rotatory severator. She looked exactly the way she had the first time they met, only this time there was a pronounced scowl on her face.

"Hey Joe," he said, hands in his pockets, feeling inexplicably guilty.

"Hey," she said, letting the wind key drop from her fingertips for a few moments as she ran the back of her hand over her forehead. "My mother didn't send you out here to help, did she? Once I get this blasted device started I'll have the wood chopped in no time."

"No," said Dean, "she didn't send me. I just wanted to let you know that Sam and me, we're leaving. Today."

"Today as in later, or today as in now?"

"Sooner than later," said Dean. "We want to make it as far as we can before dark."

"So where are you going, then?" she said, hands on her hips, hat fallen back and held only by the cord around her neck.

Dean had to swallow a couple of times before answering. "South," he said finally. It didn't really matter where when it came down to it, just that very soon they would be gone. "We got a lead on something."

Jo nodded and squared her shoulders as she looked up and met his eyes. "Well, I guess that's that, then. You think you'll be coming back up this way?"

"We've got a job to do," said Dean, unflinching even though guilt rose up in him again. "But if you think I'm going to stay away after that, you haven't been paying attention."

"Try not to get killed, then," she said. "You wouldn't want to disappoint a lady."

"I don't see any ladies here," said Dean, and only then did Jo smile.

"Come on inside," she said, setting the sawing device back on the ground, half wound. "I'll put some things together for you. Sounds like you might have a pretty long trip ahead."

: : :

"What's the matter with you?" said Sam, sitting on the edge of the bed alongside Dean after packing up the last of their things. "We've got Dad's journal, Dean. I figured you'd be happy about that."

"Yeah, well, I also know where we need to go next," said Dean, holding the book in both hands.

"Did he say something, Dean?" said Sam. "Did he leave us a message in the journal?"

"No," said Dean, "he left us a message with Ellen." Sam waited expectantly, but it was a long time before Dean sighed and finally answered. "We have to go home, Sam."

"Home?"

"Lawrence," Dean clarified, but Sam'd never called it that. Sam'd never called it home. "We need to go back to Lawrence."

 

_Lawrence, Kansas_

Jo might have given them the name of a seer whom she promised was the real thing before she let them leave the Roadhouse, but Sam and Dean had other business in Lawrence that came before anything else ever could.

Dean knew the way by instinct, like he wasn't a man but a migratory bird with a compass that always pointed home.

"This is it?" said Sam, standing with his hands in his pockets in front of a quiet barber shop. "Are you sure?"

"I'm sure," said Dean, hands stuffed in the pockets of his trousers so Sam couldn't see them shaking.

"You were only four--"

"I remember, Sam," said Dean curtly. He knew exactly where he was. "This was just about the edge of town back then. Guess you leave a place for twenty years and it grows when you weren't looking."

"I don't remember any of this," said Sam, the tails of his coat flapping lightly in the breeze. "I don't think I remember Kansas at all."

"Yeah, well, you wouldn't, would you? In all the years we've been on the road, Dad never once brought us back." Not that Dean could blame him. In all the times Dean'd been on his own, he'd never come back either. "But this is where we lived, Sammy. This is where our house stood."

"I guess you really never can go home again," said Sam. Not unless you wanted a shave and a haircut, anyway. "So where do we go from here?"

"Just give me a minute, all right?" said Dean. "Just give me a minute, Sam."

When he tilted his head just right he could still see their house standing there, the yard he used to play in, the window of his old bedroom. Of little Sammy's nursery. He even thought, for a brief, breathless moment, he saw his mother standing there, just at the edge of his vision. But when he looked she wasn't there at all. Just an oak tree, dropping the last of its leaves for winter.

"I have the address that Jo gave us," he said finally. "Unless you want to go inside."

"Do you think Dad came here?"

Dean thought about it for a moment, as he watched the red and white barber pole turn in the wind. "No, I don't think he came here," he said. "I think he already knew what was here. I think he came for something else."

"I wish I remembered it," said Sam after a lengthy silence. "I wish I remembered _her_. All our lives we've been trying to avenge a wrong that I don't even remember and never really understood." He swallowed hard and looked at the sidewalk. "Until now."

"Hard to miss something you never had," said Dean. He couldn't imagine a life where he didn't ache for what was lost as much as who was lost. Sam might have yearned for what he never had, but Dean yearned for what had slipped through his four-year-old fingers.

"She would have liked this," said Sam. "Jess, I mean. She liked to study me like she would study physics. She wanted to know what made me who I was."

"Would you have ever told her?"

"Does it matter anymore?" said Sam, reaching up to scratch the side of his nose. If it was actually to take care of something else at the corner of his eye, Dean granted him the dignity not to ask.

"Only if it matters to you," said Dean. "Do you think she would have wanted to know?"

Sam hesitated, and scratched his nose again. "Yes," he said finally. "Yes, I think she would have wanted to know. But I didn't realize that until it was too late to tell her."

Dean nodded, and clasped his hands behind his back as he stared at the barber shop that stood where his home used to be. "I hope Mom would have understood what we do," he said. "It'd kill me if I thought she was disappointed in us."

"How could she be disappointed in you, Dean?" said Sam. "You've spent your whole life helping people. She might not have wanted this, but she'd never be disappointed in you for it."

"But you think she might be disappointed in Dad."

It wasn't even a question, not really. Sam had never made it a secret what he thought of their father's parenting skills. Sam didn't answer right away, though, and Dean couldn't say whether that was because he didn't want to, or because he couldn't.

"I think she'd know he tried," he said finally, "even if he made some bad decisions."

It was probably as charitable as he was going to get, but Dean appreciated it. Even if he would never say so.

It was by unspoken agreement when they turned to go back to Tessa, and they were silent for most of the drive to the address that Jo had given them, stopping only once so that Sam could ask for directions to the unfamiliar street.

"Well, let's just hope Joe's right about her," said Dean, bringing Tessa to a stop across the street from her house. "Dad was in town for _some_ thing, and I want to know what it was."

"You're not the only one," said Sam, striding across the street before Tessa had even stopped shuddering.

The door was opening while Sam's hand was raised but before he had a chance to know, Dean taking the front steps two at a time to catch up with him.

"I would ask you what took you so long," she said, opening the door wider, "but it's clear as day where you've been. Sam. Dean. Come inside, I've been expecting you."

"How did you--?" started Dean, but Sam just grabbed his arm and hauled him in behind him. He didn't need to, though; her invitation had been as much an order as a request, and Dean was conditioned to obey those.

"You must be Miss Mosely," said Sam as she closed the door behind them. "Joe told us about you."

"Little Miss Harvelle," said Missouri, causing Dean's eyebrows to raise. Jo'd been very clear about the fact that Missouri had met her only as Joe. "Oh yes, I know all about her. You can't hide that sort of thing from me. Well, come on in and ask me what you want to ask."

"Thank you," said Sam, more gracious than Dean in accepting her hospitality. Not that Dean was ungracious, but apparently his thoughts were. "We'll try not to impose more than necessary."

"That's what all you Winchester boys say," said Missouri, sitting them down in her parlor and bringing on the tea, already brewed like she'd been expecting them.

Maybe there really was something to the whole psychic thing.

"Wait, you knew Dad?" said Dean. "You _know_ Dad?"

"I've known your Daddy for a long time," she said. "I even met you once before, but you probably don't remember me, you were such a tiny, quiet little thing at the time."

"No, that's impossible," said Dean. "We never came back here. Dad never came back here."

"No, you're right, he didn't," said Missouri. "In all those years, he never came back here, but I never forgot him. No, I met your Daddy before you ever left. And until a few weeks ago, I hadn't seen him since."

"He was here to see you," said Sam. "We were going to ask you--"

"You were going to ask me if I heard anything about him while he was in town," she finished. "And maybe, if I proved to have the Sight that Miss Harvelle claimed I have, to ask me if I knew where he was now."

"So do you?" said Dean. "Know where he is?"

She sighed and shook her head. "He said he was on the trail of something big," she said. "He was hoping there was evidence here in Lawrence that he'd missed for all these years because he'd never known what to look for."

"And did he find anything?"

"If I knew that, I would tell you," she said. "Your daddy's better than just about anybody I know at keeping what's secret secret. But I can tell you this, boys. I kept an eye on things here after you and your daddy left town, and I don't think he missed anything. I don't think there was anything to find."

"That's not the sort of news we were looking for," said Sam, but he could speak for himself, because if Dean had found there was some kind of clue here all along he might've gone mad with the knowing.

"But he _was_ here," said Dean. "When? And where did he go?"

"One question at a time, child," she said. "And drink your tea. You're so jittery I think you're going to bounce right out of that chair."

"I'm never jittery," said Dean, but Missouri Mosely's tone left no room for argument. Dean's knee was, in fact, twitching, though whether that was from the proximity of real, solid information or the fact that he was in Lawrence at all, he couldn't be sure.

"I know it's hard, honey," she said, more kindly this time. Dean had to wonder just how much she could see inside his head, and just how easy he was making it. "He only stayed a couple of days, and if it helps he misses you boys something fierce." Before anyone could say anything, she looked right at Sam and added. " _Both_ of you boys."

"Well, he certainly has a strange way of showing it," said Sam, looking down at his hands.

"I won't argue that John Winchester has made some funny choices," she said, "but I know that everything he does, he does it to protect you."

"Where was he going?" said Dean, because there was just no way that conversation was going to go in a good direction, not with Sam and not right now.

"I don't know that either," she said, "but if I had to guess, I'd say he was heading north. He was right obsessed with hearing about the weather from that way just as quick as he could get it."

"The weather?" said Sam. "He was interested in the _weather_?"

"He was looking for omens, wasn't he," said Dean. "He's following a trail of omens."

"That sounds like something your daddy would do," she agreed.

"And if that's what he did, then that's what we need to follow up on," said Dean. "We can hit the local paper first thing in the morning."

"Just as soon as we figure out where we're going to stay," said Sam.

"Oh no," said Missouri. "Don't you even start thinking I'm going to make you find a hotel or camp outside of town. I knew you boys when you were barely knee high. I can make up a room for you."

"Oh, we couldn't ask--"

"Did anybody hear anybody else asking? No? Good, then it's settled," she said. "I think I can handle a couple of boys for a few days."

"How do you know it'll be a few days?" said Dean. She just gave him a look, and he asked no more about it.

: : :

When Dean found a few dollars missing from his stash - and yes, he knew exactly how much was in it beforehand - he just figured that Sam needed a few necessities and thought no more about it. Sam had asked him for almost nothing since they'd left Stanford University with everything Sam had left in the world, so Dean figured he was entitled to a few things, even if it was Dean's hard-earned money.

Even if hard-earned, in this case, meant running hard and fast away from a card table. He didn't _cheat_ , he was just that good. Nobody liked a winner who walked away with the pot.

He didn't expect to come back from the newspaper office to find Sam sitting on his bed in their shared room, opening and closing a brand new Kodak Brownie.

"You spent money on that?" said Dean. "If you wanted a camera, Sam, I could've--"

"Made me one?" finished Sam. "Thanks, but this is one case where I'm pretty comfortable going with the commercial version. It's nice and small and simple."

Dean thought that was exactly the problem with it, but then that was probably where he and Sam differed on the subject. Maybe when Sam was sleeping he could make a few small improvements.

"You want to get a picture of me?" said Dean, posing by the door and giving Sam his broadest, fakest smile.

"Not really what I had in mind," said Sam, but once Dean's arms were down again, once he dropped the smile and went over to the dresser to empty his pockets, that was when the room was filled with the flash from Sam's camera. "That's more like it."

"That's really what you did with your day?" said Dean. "While I was busy getting information, you were taking pictures around the house?"

"Not exactly," said Sam, and from the way he placed the folding camera in his lap, the way he looked down at it, Dean guessed that the very first photograph was of a certain barbershop at the other end of town.

"Oh," he said. When the top of the dresser was covered with notes and clippings and the guts of an old pocket watch that Dean had lifted, he went over to the bed to check it out. "You know, I always thought about making myself one of these. Oh, the pictures I could have taken."

"I can only imagine," said Sam dryly. "Would you even have asked their consent?"

"Hey," said Dean, "I'm a gentleman. I never would have taken pictures of _that_."

"If I'd had one sooner," said Sam, "I'd've had a picture of Jess. I never even thought about it, Dean. I always just thought she would always be with me. I didn't once think about life after she was gone."

And he didn't need to think about it now that he was living it. Dean almost told him so, but somehow he knew it wouldn't be taken in the spirit it was intended. Maybe it couldn't be, not by Sam, not yet.

"I don't think you'll ever forget her anyway," said Dean. "I haven't seen Mom in twenty years but I still know exactly what she looks like. I can just close my eyes and there she is, standing over my bed and kissing me good-night."

Sam smiled a sad smile, his eyes still on his camera. "At least I have one of you now," he said, "in case... just in case."

"I'm not going anywhere," said Dean, even though he wasn't in any position to make that kind of promise. "It's you and me, Sam."

But maybe he would steal that camera and get a picture of Sam. Just in case.

: : :

Sam came with him the next time he pestered the newspaper office for more information, though they had little enough to begin with. Sam, who had practically lived with his nose in a book when they were younger, was good at scanning past issues of the newspaper for references in any sort of story to unusual weather north of Lawrence.

North of Lawrence covered a lot of territory.

"I might have something for you boys," said J.K. Reilly, returning from his business lunch to find Sam and Dean still in his office. "I was talking to a colleague of mine from Des Moines, and she said they covered the launching of a new series of weather balloons. Very first thing they got caught in was an electrical storm that kicked up out of nowhere."

"Des Moines?" said Dean, perking up immediately.

"Is that the kind of thing you were looking for?" he said. "Because if it's all the same to you, I'd like my office back at your earliest convenience."

"Can you tell me when this was?"

"About a month ago, more or less. They were headed west, over Sioux Territory."

"You hear that, Sam?"

"Every word," said Sam, beginning to file things away where he found them. He already had a few possible references to unusual phenomena around that time on hand, clipped and stowed, that would corroborate that.

Dean offered his hand. "You've been most obliging, Mr. Reilly. I hope we can do business together again one day."

His grunt as they shook hands suggested he would be less pleased than Dean, but he didn't voice it. After all, a small amount of money had changed hands, for the inconvenience, and they'd made it a point to leave the office in precisely the condition they'd found it in.

"I don't suppose you could give us your colleague's name?" he said. "On the chance that we ever run into her in Des Moines?"

"I’m not sure I'm doing her any favors," he said, "but it's Mrs. Helen Reilly." Dean raised his eyebrows. "My ex-wife."

Dean managed not to smile. "We'll certainly offer her the same hospitality we offered you," he said, though fundamentally it had been the other way round.

And if he lifted a silver letter opener off his desk - neither fancy nor engraved, so obviously not a keepsake - it was purely out of habit.

"So he probably went up into Sioux Territory," said Sam as they walked the side streets back to Miss Mosely's house, "but if you're right and he's following these omens, that means he'll be long gone."

"What we need to do is figure out where these omens went next," said Dean, "and that's a bigger job than both of us."

"If Dad could do it, we can do it," said Sam. But Dad had known exactly what he was looking for, and Sam and Dean were in a position of having to guess. "Omens usually mean demons."

"That they do," said Dean, but he wasn't going to jump to any conclusions. Not yet.

: : :

"I'll be glad to get out of this town," said Dean, later that night when he had a full belly and a head full of Sam's research. "I feel like we've already overstayed our welcome."

"It's strange to be here," agreed Sam, taking a few moments to care for his things, brushing dirt off his trousers and hanging his frock coat with all the care it deserved. Of all of his things, it was the only thing he had left that reflected the life he'd lived while he was away. "Sometimes it almost seems like something is familiar, even though I know that's impossible. It's as though a part of me knows this is where I come from."

"It's changed a lot," said Dean, "but my gut knows this place and my gut doesn't like it. Sometimes... I can't forget that Mom died here, Sam, I just can't. Every time I go out, I feel like I'm spotting her on every street corner."

"I thought I saw Jess," said Sam quietly. "When we were out at where the house used to be. I... sometimes I see her, out of the corner of my eye, like she's still with me."

"Well, she is," said Dean. "Not _with_ you, but... with you."

"Religious sentiments, Dean? From you?

"That's not a religious sentiment, that's just how we work," said Dean. "Do you think Dad ever forgot Mom, even for a moment?"

"I'd say when he was hacking the heads off vampires she probably wasn't foremost in his mind," said Sam. But that didn't mean that perhaps in the corner of his father's eye, when he went about his business, there wasn't a blonde figure just like Sam's, just like Dean's, watching over him. "I miss her, Dean."

"Of course you do," he said. "Hell, I only knew her for a day and I miss her too. She was something else, Sam. Nobody's asking you not to miss that."

"Do you know it's been a month?" said Sam. "Not today exactly, but a month since... since it happened."

"Yeah, I know," said Dean quietly. He'd never say so, but he'd been counting the days, and wondering if Sam was going to want to observe it in some way. Dean didn't care to celebrate the anniversaries of deaths, but he'd never seen things quite the same way as Sam had. It was a relief when the day passed and he hadn't. "What did she look like, when you saw her?"

"Jess?" said Sam. "She looked like...." For a moment, just a moment, he looked almost content. "We were in love, Dean. She used to... stay with me, when she could. She looked like she did then, hair unbound, in her long, white nightdress. I always thought she never looked more beautiful than she looked when I knew it was just for me."

Dean had never doubted, from the moment he first saw his brother again, from the moment he saw the woman by his side, smart and fierce and exactly what his brother had always needed in his life, that Sam loved her. That she was far beyond friend, far beyond even lady friend. No matter what he said, he knew that. And he wished, for Sam's sake, for his _own_ sake, that he'd gotten a chance to know her better. He would never have the chance to know her now, except through Sam's eyes.

"That's what Mom looks like when I see her," said Dean, which given the context might have been inappropriate, but the words came flying out nonetheless. He hadn't been intending to say them at all. "That's what she looked like the last time I saw her. It happened when she was putting us to bed."

"Oh," said Sam softly, and with unusual discretion for him when the subject of their mother came up, he didn't press.

And Dean didn't offer any more. He didn't offer that he'd seen her earlier too, hovering near the edges of where their home had once stood, silent and watching him. Dean had felt his mother had been watching him his whole life, and he often thought he glimpsed her in a crowd, glimpsed her in passing as they traveled through one town after another, but this was the first time he really felt like she was there.

He never wanted to come back to Lawrence. He _still_ didn't want to be in Lawrence. But coming to Lawrence meant picking up their father's trail again, and that was worth the ache that he felt being back in what had once been his home.

: : :

"You boys have got someone looking for you," said Missouri, once again opening the door for them before they'd had time to knock.

"That's never going to stop getting under my skin," said Dean, shaking his head. "You just _know_ somebody's looking for us?"

"While I do have a telephone," she pointed out to them, "and people do occasionally try to reach me on it, yes, I just know somebody's looking for you. Or rather, I know that you're on somebody's mind, and there's someplace you need to be. Do you have any more business in Lawrence, or can you pack your things an be on your way?"

"That eager to get rid of us?" said Dean. "Unless Dad's hiding out in somebody's basement, I've been ready to leave this town from the moment we arrived."

"Oh, Dean," she said, and didn't explain but Dean could see something like sympathy in her expression. He didn't want sympathy. And besides, they had half a trail now that led north, and Dean was ready to follow it, further research be damned.

"Who, Miss Mosely?" said Sam. "Who do we need to see?"

"Your Uncle Bobby, of course," she said, "but then you already know that, don't you, Sam?"

"I... how would I know that?"

"You know how," she said, lowering her chin and looking up at him with just her eyes. "You know exactly what I'm talking about, Sam Winchester."

Maybe Sam knew what she was talking but, but somebody was leaving Dean in the dark here. Two somebodies. And he found he didn't much like it.

"You knew Uncle Bobby needed us and you didn't say anything?" said Dean. "Did he send you a message?"

"Not exactly," admitted Sam, giving Missouri a nod that he probably thought Dean wouldn't catch. "And I'm not sure that he needs us so much as he knows that we need him."

"We need him? What for?"

"I don't know," said Sam, looking to Missouri for help.

"I think only your Uncle Bobby can tell you that," she said, "but if you want my guess, I'd say that the one thing the two of you need help with is finding your Daddy, and if there's one person who can help you with that, it's someone your Daddy trusts like your Uncle Bobby."

His father and Bobby had something of a volatile relationship, even more so in the years since Sam had left to go to Stanford, but one thing Dean could not deny was that his father trusted Bobby as much as he trusted anyone. Though, deservedly, he wasn't sure that trust went both ways.

"It's a hell of a journey, getting up to Bobby's place," said Dean, letting out a low whistle. And, probably not coincidentally, it was exactly in the direction they'd already been planning to go. "We should get on the road as soon as we can, if that's where we're going. Is that where we're going, Sam?"

There was a challenge in that question, practically a dare for Sam to explain to him just what the hell was going on and what sort of secrets he was sharing with Missouri Mosely.

"I think so, yes," he said finally. "I'm not positive, but I think so."

"One day soon you're going to tell me just how you think so," muttered Dean. "All right, you go start packing our things and I'll hit the telegraph office. It ought to still be open."

Sam pulled out his pocket watch and nodded. "Still plenty of time," he said.

"Well, the two of your aren't going anywhere till morning, so Dean you go and do your thing, and Sam you go and do yours, and I'll make sure you both at least have a decent meal in you before you take off again."

It had been a few days of good meals and soft beds - and those after the luxuries they'd enjoyed at Harvelle's Roadhouse - so Dean definitely wasn't going to turn one last one down. They'd be roughing it again soon enough.

 

_Mary, Missouri_

They spent the night outside a little town called Mary, which made Dean a little uneasy for no good reason. He wanted to make good time while they still had good roads to make it on, especially since Sam had seemed pretty edgy ever since they left Lawrence, in contrast to Dean who felt only - or almost only - relief.

"So are we going to talk about this now?"

"Talk about what?" said Sam, taking his turn to build up the fire. "I don't know what that means."

"You don't know what that means," said Dean, nodding his head and tensing his jaw. "It means I want to know what the hell you and Missouri were talking about, Sam. I want to know what secret you told her and not me."

"I didn't tell her anything, Dean," said Sam. "I didn't tell anyone. She just... knew."

"Knew _what_? I was decent enough not to ask you when you were trapped inside a moving vehicle with me but you're not getting out of it so easily now."

"All right," said Sam, breaking up a branch with his hands and feeding some more wood onto the fire. "Just promise to hear me out, all right?"

"Since I'm practically begging you to talk to me, Sam, I think that's about the only promise I _can_ make. I'm listening. Now tell me something."

Sam broke another stick in two before talking. "I... the thing is... all right, this is going to sound worse than it is."

"At this point, Sam, I don't know how that's possible."

"I have visions, Dean."

The words hung in the night air between them for a long, long time, broken only by the crackle of the fire. For a moment Dean was certain that he heard wrong, but the words made everything else make sense. As much sense as any of their lives made.

"You have... visions," he repeated. "And just how long has that been going on?"

"Shortly before you came for me," Sam quietly admitted. "I don't really understand them, Dean. I wasn't even sure they _were_ visions until we met Missouri."

"So you talked to her about this. You talked to somebody else about this before you talked to me."

"She's a psychic, Dean. I didn't _want_ to tell her about it, she just plucked it right out of my head and confronted me when you were out." He poked at the fire with his stick, sending sparks in the air, then carelessly tossed it on and waited for it to ignite before saying anything else. "That's where the headaches come from."

"Like the one you had back at Ellen's saloon," said Dean. He should have pushed harder, pursued that one till Sam gave in. "So what was _that_ one about?"

"I don't know," said Sam, to Dean's grunt of frustration. "I don't, Dean! They're mostly just images, flashes of things. Most of it doesn't mean anything to me. They might as well be memories for all the good they do me."

"Tell me anyway," said Dean.

"Bobby was there," Sam admitted after another few moments of silence passed. "Something was on fire and... and you were falling."

"So you knew we needed to see Uncle Bobby all along and you didn't say anything to me?" said Dean. "Do you really even _want_ to find Dad, Sam, or is this whole thing just some kind of game to you?"

"I didn't know anything, Dean. I _still_ don't know anything. I saw Bobby, so what? It could be something that happens years from now, or some memory from years ago."

"Yeah, somehow I doubt you believe either one of those," said Dean. "From now on you tell me, Sam. You tell me when you're having one of these visions of yours and you tell me what you see. If you can't figure them out, maybe I can."

"I think you'll be able to tell when I'm having one," said Sam, and Dean couldn't help but remember the sight of his brother wracked with pain on the floor of a saloon in Broken Bow. "All right, Dean, I'll tell you. But don't expect it to do us any good."

"At least I'll be a part of making that decision," said Dean. "Now tell me about me falling."

Sam winced and shook his head. "Can we just eat something?" he said. "It's been a long day and you want to get an early start tomorrow."

"Do I die?" said Dean. "Is that why you don't want to tell me?"

"No!" said Sam quickly, though something crossed his face that made Dean wonder if he was lying. "It's just a long fall. You're hurt, but I don't know how badly."

"Where am I falling from? Are we talking about a fall from Bobby's roof, or the edge of a cliff?"

"I don't know, Dean," said Sam. "I've told you everything I know. The visions aren't like seeing the future. They're like seeing a photograph that moves for only a second, and you're meant to interpret a whole story from one little movement. I could try, but I'd only get it wrong."

"Fine," said Dean, finally digging a couple of tins out of the automobile. "We'll eat something. But quit keeping things from me, Sam."

It was hard enough getting to know his brother again without having to dig through his secrets too.

 

_Southern Sioux Territory_

Sam hadn't traveled this trail in a long time, long enough that the landmarks they passed might've been pictures he saw in a book once instead of places he remembered from his childhood. They didn't often hunt here; it was seldom needed or wanted. The last time, in fact, had been just like this, taking the direct route to Uncle Bobby's place, on the small parcel of land known as Dakota.

"I've got a couple of friends out this way," said Dean, steering hard to the left around some debris on the trail. "They're familiar with Tessa."

"I'm sure that's meant to be reassuring," said Sam, watching over the side of the vehicle as they passed through the prairie, never straying from the road. Once Dean got her going it was a pretty quiet ride, quiet enough that Sam caught the occasional glimpse of wildlife completely undisturbed by their passage.

If there had been demonic omens in this area a month ago, there was certainly no sign of them now.

Dean had a habit of singing old sea shanties as they rode, changing the lyrics to suit a life spent on land, and while it might not have been Sam's favorite it was at least something familiar, almost a lullaby. An indecent, raucous lullaby.

"I think we're coming up on something," said Dean as they topped a hill, starting to pick up a little speed as they came down the other side over clear grassland, crisp with frost. "Up ahead, do you see that?"

"It looks like a white buffalo," said Sam. "I didn't know those were a real thing."

"They're rare," said Dean. "Sacred. I've never actually seen one before."

As they drew close, though, and the buffalo moved little from its position by the path, they could see that it wasn't an animal at all, much as it had been designed to look like one.

"I'm pulling over," said Dean, and left the boiler running as he got out of the vehicle. Sam hoped one of the valves didn't choose that moment to pop and hiss and ruin the moment. He, too, pushed open his door and stepped out of the vehicle, leaning against part of the support structure and looking over at the object of Dean's fascination.

The buffalo, large and gleaming white, was almost completely constructed of wheels and gears and cogs meticulously carved from bone and antler, all turning almost silently together to make a majestic, clockwork creature.

"He's beautiful," said Dean, hand lifted as if he expected to be able to touch him and feel real animal hide. "There must be a village near here."

There was a sound from overhead, a rustling, clicking sound, and then a giant bird came into sight, gliding over the treetops. It was the same bone white of the buffalo with rare flashes of metal springs inside, tiny pieces working in perfect synch to allow it to fly over them.

And as Dean stood there, coat strapped on tight against the cold, hands in the pockets of his heavy trousers, he tilted his head back and silently stared at the sky. The shadow of the clockwork thunderbird passed over him as it circled above before heading east again, back towards the village it watched over.

Sam very quietly took a picture.

"Now that's something else," Dean said when it was gone again, when the white buffalo too had begun moving away over the brittle grass.

"They're going to know we're here now."

"They already did," said Dean, his breath leaving little frosty clouds to drift away on the breeze. "All right, let's go. We can be there in a couple of days if the bridge isn't out."

"And here I thought Tessa could float," said Sam, putting the camera away and then smirking at him. "It can do everything else."

"She _can_ , but the steering's a bitch," said Dean.

"Wait, are you being serious?" said Sam. "We can take her on the water?"

Dean just grinned at him as he got back into the car and refused to answer.

: : :

There was a dust cloud ahead of them on the old wagon trail, indistinct at first before resolving itself into a galloping horse and its long trail of dust.

"Wow, he's sure coming on fast," said Dean, pulling Tessa over and driving in the grass to let the rider pass.

Sam looked back over his shoulder, just tall enough to be able to see over all the apparati in the back. "Do you think there's a fire?"

"Probably running from something," said Dean, as the horse came galloping down the hill. But the rider was fussing with something at his side, no _her_ side; they were just near enough now to see both her skirts and her hair flying out behind her. They were heading full bore at one another when she smoothly reached down and unfurled something - a flag - out behind her.

"Stop the car, Dean!"

Dean was already stopping, though, the moment he saw what she was flying. Red background; white pentacle.

"I'm guessing she's here for us," he said. And if she wasn't, they'd get the hell out of her way anyway. Anyone going that speed and flying that emblem to identify herself was a woman on a mission.

When they stopped so did she, slowing to a canter and then a walk to cool her horse down for a few minutes before stowing the flag again and dismounting.

"Bobby Singer sent me," she said, right then and there opening all the right doors with the Winchester boys. Who she obviously knew on sight.

"We're already on our way to see him," said Dean, as Tessa shook a couple times and then sighed to an actual stop. "We wired to tell him we were coming."

"He got it, but he's not there anymore," she said. "I'm to tell the two of you to meet him in Chicago instead. And also to tell Dean that you need to fix your vehicle there up with some wireless telegraph equipment." She gave him a once-over and then a sly smile. "You must be Dean."

"Now what the hell is he doing in Chicago?" said Dean. "Pardon my language."

"I would if you'd said anything worth pardoning," she said. "He got a line on something he thought you boys would be interested in, and didn't figure on you wanting to detour over to Dakota if you didn't have to."

Dean looked back at Sam, wondering if Sam's vision had just meant they were going to meet up with Bobby, or whether it was telling them to go to his home. Sam didn't give him a clue, but he did step forward to identify himself.

"Sam Winchester," he said, offering her his hand.

"Pamela Barnes," she returned. "And I've already met Dean, of course. So are we going to play twenty questions, or are you boys going to trust me and change course?"

"He's already on his way?"

"Left yesterday, by train," she said. "He'll beat you there by at least two days, but that should give him time to set things up."

"Set what things up?" said Sam.

Dean and Pamela both turn their heads to give him a look. It had been a few years, but it hadn't been _that_ long. "It's Bobby," said Dean. "He probably had to take the train because he had a trunk full of books and gadgetry that just had to come with him."

"You _do_ know him fairly well," said Pamela admiringly.

"We've known Uncle Bobby since we were kids," said Dean, "and in all that time he's never changed." Hell, Dean'd build a good chunk of Tessa up at Bobby's place, out of whatever scrap he had around. "Are you heading into Chicago too?"

"I've got some other business to take care of first," she said. "Why, do you _want_ me to be heading into Chicago with you, Mr. Winchester?"

"It would certainly liven up the scenery," said Dean appreciatively. "How long do you think this business of yours is going to take you?"

"Dean," said Sam, quiet and low, from behind him, but Dean ignored him. After all, she started it.

"Not so long that I won't be able to catch up with you there," she said, pulling a notebook from her pocket and tearing a page from it. "Bobby said he'll leave a message at this hotel for you boys. He wasn't sure when he left just where he'd end up staying."

"Thank you," said Dean, glancing at it before folding it in half and tucking it into a coat pocket. "I guess we'll be needing to take a turn for the northeast then."

"Do you need me to dig out the map?" said Sam, but Dean shook his head. He knew the way to Chicago well enough, especially once they got back on a well-traveled road again.

"Well, it's been lovely meeting you," said Pamela, "but I can eat up a lot more miles before sunset if I carry on. Give Bobby a big hug for me, will you?"

"We'll give him one in spirit," Dean promised her. Pamela just laughed and threw herself back in the saddle, stowing the hunters' flag in a saddlebag once again.

"Safe trip!" she said, and started off down the trail again at an only slightly slower pace than before. Dean watched until all he could see of her was a cloud of dust once again.

"Should I have asked her to stay for dinner?" he said finally, starting the automobile up again.

"Bobby sure makes some interesting friends," said Sam, which was a kind of agreement, in a way. "What do you think he's got in Chicago?"

"It's Bobby, so I have no idea," said Dean, "but whatever it is, it's probably important. Or at the very least interesting."

"I think my vision might have taken place in Chicago," admitted Sam a few moments later. "Or at least, I think it might've taken place in a city. Right now Chicago seems the most likely candidate."

"Well, then Chicago it is," said Dean. "It's as good a destination as any."

It was a few seconds after that when Tessa was primed to go once again, and as soon as she was Dean was back on the road.

 

_Chicago, Illinois_

The message at the front desk was addressed to Frank Merriwell, which Dean got on his second try, even though he was pretty sure he was no longer wanted under his real name in Chicago anyway. That had all been a misunderstanding, and surely forgotten by now.

"He's rented a house," said Dean, reading the note with some amusement, not to mention curiosity. "Apparently he intends to get comfortable and stay a while."

"If he's comfortable, that means we're going to be comfortable," said Sam, plucking the address from Dean's fingers so he could read it himself. "I'm less sold on the idea of staying."

"Well, let's see what he's got before we decide anything," said Dean, taking the note back and tucking it away with all the others he'd collected over the past weeks. "He said we'd be interested in what's going on here. Maybe we will be."

"Even if we are, nothing comes before our goal, Dean. Not even an interesting hunt for Uncle Bobby."

"Let's just find out, Sam," said Dean. Bobby was pretty sharp, after all. If he thought they'd be interested, odds were they would.

It was Chicago, so Dean's automobile wasn't the novelty it had been in a lot of the other towns they'd passed through, but Tessa was still unlike anything else on the road so she got her share of stares, parked out on the street in front of the hotel. Dean just gave a cocky wave as he started her up.

They found the address Bobby left them on a quiet, tree-lined street, the very last sort place the average person would ever expect to find any unusual goings-on. The house was just on the shabby side of the others on the street, but not notable in any other way.

"Home sweet home," said Dean, pulling Tessa around behind so she wouldn't be quite so conspicuous. There were times when a man wanted to be remembered, and there were times when he did not.

Bobby met them at the back door, at the top of a set of narrow, rickety stairs that obviously hadn't seen maintenance in years.

"Bout time you got here," he said, snatching the hat right off Sam's head as soon as he got close enough and ruffling his hair like he was twelve years old again. "You're looking good, Sam."

"Hey, what about me?" said Dean. "Aren't I looking good, too?"

"I wasn't worried about how _you_ were looking, Dean," he said gruffly. "You look the same as the last time I saw you. Sam here doesn't."

"Been a while," said Sam, and let Bobby ruffle his hair some more before starting up the steps to the house.

"Well, y'all better get on inside so I can catch up on just what you were coming up to see me about," he said, moving aside so they could pass. He did rest a hand on Sam's shoulder for a moment, though. "I was sorry to hear about your girl, Sam."

Sam paused in the doorway. "You know about that?"

"Word gets around," said Bobby, and followed them through the back porch into the homey kitchen. Bobby had the woodstove burning and had spread out his day's research on what a reasonable person would expect to be the dining room table.

"Well, I'll skip all of the details and get right to the point," said Dean, lingering by the stove to warm his hands. "For the past month, month and a half, Sam and I have been trying to catch up with Dad. Our path finally led us to you."

"You boys don't have the good sense the Lord gave an ass," said Bobby, shaking his head at them. "You didn't think to come to me _first_ when your daddy took off on his own?"

"Would you have had anything to tell us? _Do_ you have anything to tell us?"

"Do I know where he is? No," said Bobby. "Do I know what he's doing? Yes, I do. I'm the one who sent that no-good daddy of yours on the trail of the demon in the first place." Then he sighed and reached for Sam's coat so that he could hang it on a hook by the door. "The two of you'd better take a seat. It looks like we have even more to talk about than I thought we did."

"I think there's a beginning we missed there somewhere," said Dean, unstrapping his own coat but leaving it on for the moment, until he felt warm again. "Dad? Demon? What?"

Bobby nodded and put the kettle on. "It started right around the middle of October," he said. "That's when I got a message through to your daddy that we finally spotted some signs of the demon that killed your mother."

"It's a demon?" said Dean. "You know for sure?"

"We know for sure," Bobby confirmed. "Or we do now, anyway. He didn't want the two of you in the line of fire, and I can't say I blame him. He's put the two of you through enough over the years."

"But that's not why he did it, is it?" said Dean. "He left us behind because he thought we'd get in the way."

"He went on his own because he wanted to end this," said Bobby. "For all of you."

"Well, I guess the omens weren't too accurate, because I know where the demon was at the end of October and it wasn't out east," said Sam.

Bobby winced and nodded his head. "That was unanticipated," he said, "but it didn't make the information we got wrong. This demon's got a plan, and the omens pointed east for a reason. We don't know what he was doing, but he was doing something."

"You're not going to keep us off his tail now, are you?" said Dean.

"Would I have called you here if I was?" said Bobby, but Dean had been around the block enough times to notice he hadn't exactly answered the question. "We've had some pretty big omens over Chicago for the past few weeks, and I'm betting it has something to do with you."

"Omens like the omens Dad is chasing?" said Dean. "You think it's coming here?"

"Well, the omens don't come equipped with a demon's name in lights, but the signs match up," said Bobby.

"So that means Dad might be coming _here_ ," Sam summed up, "if he's following the same omens that you are."

"I think that's a distinct possibility," said Bobby. "Nothing's happened here yet that would indicate the specific presence of the demon he's hunting but, well, I suspect that's only a matter of time."

"All right," said Sam, lacing his fingers together and leaning forward on the table. "Where do we start?"

: : :

There were rooms upstairs for them to settle themselves into, furnished in Spartan fashion but still more than enough for their needs. Bobby'd already set himself up in the largest, debris scattered from end to end, and Sam was quick enough to grab the one with the largest bed. It was a luxury he hadn't enjoyed since Stanford, and everything he'd lost there.

While Dean was unpacking his things, settling in for the long haul they all suspected, Sam left what little he had on the floor of his room and went back downstairs to the kitchen for tea.

"Sam," said Bobby, pushing his magnifying spectacles up onto his forehead, a pair nearly identical to the ones Jessica had owned. Whatever he was working on, fussing with tiny gears and levers, Sam could no more identify it than most things that Jess worked on in his presence. "Have a seat."

"I just came down for something to warm me up," he said, but Bobby's invitation seemed insistent, and there was already a pot of tea on the table. "What's that?"

"With any luck," said Bobby, consulting the ancient book that he'd apparently gotten the design from, "it will help us track this bastard. I've made some improvements."

"You sound just like Dean," said Sam, with all the fondness due someone you though of as extended family.

"More likely that Dean sounds like me," said Bobby, moving his things aside so he could pour the steeped tea, two teacups already waiting on the table. "He still upstairs?"

"Last I checked," said Sam. "If we're lucky, he's taking a bath."

"If he is, it's only because he wants to get in there before you have the chance," said Bobby. "Sam... I've known your family for a long time. Nearly as long as you've been alive."

"I was so small when we met you," agreed Sam. "I barely remember it. I couldn't have been more than three."

"So I've known your daddy a long time," Bobby went on. "I've watched him over these many years, and watched how this quest consumed everything in his life. Even the things it should never have touched."

"I'm not sure I understand," said Sam, sipping his tea and letting it warm him. "What are you getting at, Bobby?"

Bobby sighed, obviously awkward with either the topic of conversation, or the fact that he was attempting to have it with Sam. "I am truly sorry about Jessica, Sam," he said finally, "and I know how you must feel--"

"I'm sure you don't."

"--because I lost my wife a very long time ago," Bobby finished, as though Sam had never interrupted. Sam nodded, and though he was still in a place where he felt that nobody could ever have felt what he's feeling, he didn't belittle Bobby's loss. "And I know how much you want revenge for that, especially now that you know what did it. But...."

"But what, Bobby?" said Sam. "We're already closing on this demon, or at least Dad is. It's a hunt like any other hunt. Revenge is what we do."

"Not the way your Daddy did it," said Bobby. "He loves you boys something fierce, but he didn't always do right by you. I don't want to see you become the man he was."

"I could do worse," said Sam defensively. He could criticize his father all he wanted, but when someone else did it, the Winchester loyalty kicked in. Even when that someone else was as close to family as you got without being blood.

"You could do much worse," agreed Bobby, "and your daddy does have a number of admirable traits, Sam. But his obsession with revenge against the demon who killed your mother isn't one of them. I admire a man with the drive to succeed at what he does, and I admire a man even more whose vocation involves protection of innocents, but you and Dean were innocents, too."

Sam sipped his tea and couldn't find the right words to argue with that, even though it didn't sit right with him.

"I'm sorry about your wife," he said finally. "I didn't know."

"I didn't tell you," said Bobby, "and I mightn't have told you now if not for the fact that I recognize that look in your eyes, Sam. I know this won't help right now, but it does get better. You'll never forget her, and you might never entirely lose that anger against the thing that did this to you, but it'll get better."

"Now you sound like a preacher," said Sam tightly, sipping his hot tea again. "I'm sure Pastor Jim could come up with some nice words of comfort for me."

"Jim Murphy's a good man," said Bobby, "but I'm not telling you these things because the Good Book tells us so. I'm telling you because I've been where you are and felt what you're feeling. It's good you've hooked up with Dean again. You need your brother right now, Sam."

"I don't think Dean would have given me any choice, if I'd tried to refuse." He'd hardly had a choice even before the demon had taken his Jess. Saying good-bye that time had been one of the hardest things he'd ever done.

"You and Dean, you were always different," said Bobby, "for all that you were raised the same. But Dean's a good man. Trust him whenever you need anything, Sam."

"I always have," said Sam, "and I always will."

: : :

It took a couple of days for all of Sam's belongings to migrate from Tessa into the bedroom he'd claimed as his own, moving just a few things at a time here and there as he needed them. One of the last to come - and what maybe should have been the first - was the only real memento he had left of Jess.

He knew Dean was lingering in the doorway as he unwrapped it, but he didn't say anything until all the pieces were laid out on the bed.

Dean cleared his throat. "Do you mind if I take a look?" he said. "I have to admit, I've been a bit curious about it."

"By all means," said Sam. What he had left with Jess was a tiny, private world, but if he wanted anyone else to be invited, it was Dean. "She was so clever, Dean. She would have done amazing things."

"I have no doubt about that," said Dean. "After all, she was clever enough to fall in love with my little brother, wasn't she?"

His hands were gentle on the device, but Sam still held his breath as Dean explored it, examining all the bits and pieces. He didn't say anything, but just having Dean call up the memory of the way Jess looked at him sometimes, the way he knew she loved him, was enough to momentarily overwhelm him.

"This goes here," said Dean finally, twisting a screw with his fingertips and attaching an oddly shaped mirror to the edge of the long, cylindrical center. "There should be a matching one for the other side."

"You know what it is?" said Sam, searching for a piece identical to the one Dean had just placed.

"I don't think anybody but Jessica knows what this is," said Dean, "but I can see how some of it's put together. I won't be able to do much without my tools, though."

"Just... don't break it," said Sam after a moment, tacit permission that he barely dared to give. "It's all I have."

Dean nodded, waiting a few moments before lifting his eyes to Sam's. "You know this isn't her, right?" he said, taking the piece from Sam's fingers and finding the tiny screw that was meant to hold it. "She lives inside your head now. Even if anything ever happens to this, nothing's going to change that."

"Still," said Sam. "Please, Dean."

"I'll be careful," Dean promised him. "You know I'll be careful, Sammy. I know what she was to you."

"Do you?" said Sam. "Because the last time we talked--"

"Of course I do," said Dean. "I don't have to have been in love to know what it means, Sam. You think I wouldn't do nearly anything to get her back for you? Even if it meant never seeing you again?"

"Dean...."

"It would've killed me, but I would've done it," said Dean, looking down at his hands as his fingers swiftly turned the screw, well practiced at the motion. "I always wanted you to be happy. I just wished you could've been happy without leaving us behind, too."

"I didn't know how," said Sam. "Maybe eventually I would have figured that out."

Now, weeks distant from the fire and back in his brother's orbit again, Sam could only hope he was the kind of person who might have one day found a compromise between the two worlds. It made him _ache_ , even with all the things he'd be facing that he once hoped never to face again, to think about life without his brother again.

"You must have watched Jess work a lot," said Dean, not quite changing the subject but not quite _not_ , either, "if she always sneaked over to your rooms to do it."

"I liked to watch," admitted Sam. "She would be working on building something and I would be studying my books next to her, and my attention would always be drawn to her. It never mattered that I didn't understand it." And if watching someone work like that was something familiar from his childhood, he hoped Dean knew that without Sam having to spell it out. "I like it when things work, but I never spent a lot of time wondering how they did."

"That is something I never did understand about you," said Dean, shaking his head sadly and then rubbing his hand, his fingertips sore and reddened from the pressure of the tiny, sharp screws.

"Well, it's entirely your fault, of course," insisted Sam. "You always gave me everything I needed, since I was a baby."

"I'm pretty sure Dad did most of the caring for you when you were an infant."

His father might've taken care of his basic needs, but Sam didn't need to remember all of it to know who'd taken care of him.

A moment later, a moment of watching Dean continue to work with the tiny bits and pieces, he got up and rummaged through his things until he found a small wooden box, his small treasury of keepsakes. From it he pulled an old tin automaton, dinted with chipping paint but treasured all the same.

"My first toy," he said, holding it out to Dean. "You were caring for me even then."

Dean touched it wonderingly, scrubbing away a bit of dirt with the pad of his thumb. "I can't believe you still have this Sammy," he said. "I thought you lost it years ago."

"No, never," said Sam. "It's the only thing I've had my whole life."

"Mine, too," said Dean, touching the worn features of his face gently. "It used to be mine, before... before I gave it to you. I never thought I'd see it again."

"Dad tried to throw it away a couple of times, but I always rescued it," said Sam. "I never had to make anything or figure out how it worked because you always did it for me."

"That's exactly what I told Dad when he asked my why my Latin was so rusty," said Dean. "I told him that was Sammy's job. He didn't... I'm a lot better at it than I used to be, now."

Sam didn't need to be told why and silently nodded his head, putting the toy back where it had come from, safe and sound.

"Let's go get your tools," he said when he returned. "It would mean a lot to know what she was working on."

"I'll do whatever I can," Dean promised him.

: : :

Sam insisted they take the elevated train into the city, despite Dean's protests that Tessa could get them there faster and more comfortably. Sam wanted, just for a little while, to travel like a normal person, to walk where they could and take the streetcar where they couldn't.

Everything was decorated for Christmas, wreaths on doors and candles in windows and cheery tunes drifting out onto the street from shop fronts. It was only a matter of time before carolers showed up at their front door.

"You've got some money on you, don't you?" said Sam, tucking his gloveless hands into the pockets of his coat.

"Of course I do," said Dean. "You need something?"

"I was just thinking I could do some Christmas shopping while we're here," said Sam. "There aren't a lot of days left."

"Who are you going to buy Christmas presents for, Sam? Me? Bobby?"

"Yes, you and Bobby," said Sam, and tried not to think about who he would have been buying for not so long ago. Not just Jessica, but the other friends he'd made at Stanford, people he hadn't even thought about in weeks.

"So you want me to give you money so that you can buy me a present," said Dean, raising an eyebrow at him. "Is that what you're saying?"

"Well, if you don't _want_ a Christmas present," said Sam, "then far be it from me to insist."

Dean handed over a couple of dollars. "Make it something nice," he said, stuffing the rest back into an inside pocket of his coat before anybody saw. Sam hadn't the faintest idea what he was going to get, but if they were going to be sitting tight in Chicago waiting for either his father or the demon, whichever came first, then Sam was going to do what he could to make the holiday as ordinary a one as he could.

He hoped it would make him forget, but more likely it would just make him remember.

"This is a little bit like San Francisco," he said, glancing up at the sky as they walked, watching the path of the airships as they approached the twin docking spires that marked Central Station. "But only if you look up."

"Looking up I'm fine with," said Dean, gazing up at the sky alongside him. "It's looking down I'm not as fond of."

"You never used to be afraid."

"I'm not _afraid_ ," insisted Dean, "I just think there are more natural ways to travel than up in the air with the birds. If we'd been intended to fly, we'd have been born with wings."

"And if we'd been meant to ride around in a motor vehicle, we'd have been born with wheels," refuted Sam. One day, though, one day he would convince Dean to tell him just what happened.

"At least automobiles stay on the ground. Most of the time," said Dean, pausing against the brick of a storefront and looking up at the sky again. "I'm not in cities often."

"Jess would have been able to tell you where most of them come from, just from the shape of the gondola and the color of the envelope," said Sam. "San Francisco got a lot of traffic from across the Pacific."

"What about you?" said Dean. "You any good at it?"

Sam shielded his eyes from the weak December sunlight and looked at the airships slowly moving overhead. "That one came from Constantinople," said Sam, pointing almost straight up above them. "Passenger traffic, not trade. They're very distinctive."

"Impressive," said Dean as it floated overhead, making steady careful progress to the docking spire. "What about that one?"

Sam squinted, trying to identify it. "I think it might be Europ--" he managed to get out before the shattering pain hit, bringing him to his knees on the street.

Images of a violent encounter flashed in front of his eyes, each one of them bringing a new wave of pain. A knife flying through the air, aeroautomata diving from the sky, a fire, a skinny boy with angry eyes, and again, Dean, falling.

He didn't know how long it was before he heard Dean calling his name, felt him holding his shoulders, but he would bet good money that it wasn't the first time Dean called.

He tried to say something, anything, just to let Dean know he was okay, but the pain was still too overwhelming. It wasn't until the flashes stopped, until the pain faded to a sharp ache, that Sam was able to even open his eyes.

"I think our plan to go incognito today just failed," he said as soon as Sam met his eyes. "Another one?"

Sam nodded, and immediately decided he wasn't going to be doing that again until the ache subsided. "More of the same," he said. "Fighting, fire, and...."

"And me dying," finished Dean. "Charming."

"I only see you fall, Dean, I don't see you land."

"That doesn't exactly make me feel any better," said Dean. "Do you think you might be able to stand up, Sammy, because we're attracting a little more attention here that I like."

It was a struggle, but Sam said, "As long as you give me a hand," and willed the pain to go away.

" _Now_ are you sorry we didn't bring Tessa?" said Dean, helping Sam to his feet again and leaning him against the brick storefront. "Come on, let's get you home. We need to tell Bobby about this. No arguments."

: : :

"This would be easier if you told us exactly what we were looking for," said Dean, curled up in front of the blazing fire with a book and a whiskey and resenting every moment of it. Well, maybe not the whiskey. "'Something I don't know' is a little non-specific."

"Something we haven't tried already," Bobby clarified, which was at least a little more helpful. "The latest omens still point straight at Chicago but that doesn't narrow it down enough for us to do anything about it."

"Yes, I noticed that," said Dean. "Well, at least this isn't pawing through more national weather reports, so it's got that going for it. I think my fingers are permanently stained from the newsprint ink."

"There's more when you've finished with that one," said Bobby, nodding at a pile on the end table that Dean had somehow managed not to notice when he sat down. "And I want to go over the _Lesser Key of Solomon_ with you boys one more time."

"How can you possibly have brought this many books with you?" said Dean. "Did you pack your entire household into steamer trunks?"

"If these had been my books, don't you think I would already know what's in them?" said Bobby. "I went to see an old friend of mine yesterday. She loaned me all of those."

"Remind me to thank her for that," muttered Dean. "What are _you_ doing, anyway? How come I'm combing through all these books by myself?"

"I'm hanging the holly," said Bobby, in a tone that suggested his task should have been self-evident.

"You're hanging the holly," said Dean incredulously. "Really, Bobby?"

"It has plenty of protective and ritualistic uses," insisted Bobby. "It's not entirely for decoration."

"I'm pretty sure that's not why you're hanging it a few days before Christmas," said Dean, one eye on the book and one eye on the holly. "I don't remember you being this invested in the holidays."

"You haven't spent the holidays with me since you were little," said Bobby, "and I usually don't spend them shut up at home, I make someone else do the decorating and the cooking and just show up with a few gifts and a good bottle of alcohol."

"That's the way to do it," said Dean, flipping the page. "Looks nice, though."

"Well, this year I've not only got you boys, but Pamela ought to be back here in the next couple of days too," said Bobby. "Is there anything you think we should be doing for the holiday, Dean? Maybe something you boys did with your daddy?"

"There isn't much we did with Dad at Christmas that can be called any kind of tradition," said Dean with a shake of his head. "Or at least not any tradition either one of us wants to repeat. Just... make it nice for Sammy, okay, Bobby? That's all I want."

"That I can do," said Bobby, "just as soon as I get this holly hung and bring the tree in."

"You got a Christmas tree, too?" said Dean. "I don't even know where you'd find a Christmas tree around here."

"You can find just about anything if you know where to look," said Bobby. "And speaking of finding things, how's your search going."

"It's going," grumbled Dean, burying his nose in the book again and counting the minutes till Sam came home and he could foist the task off onto him. Maybe before that happened, though, he could help Bobby bring the tree in.

It was only when major holidays rolled around that Dean was able to place where he'd been a year earlier, the rest of the dates running together into seasons. Dean remembered the weather better than he remembered the date. A year ago, give or take a few days, he'd been somewhere in Texas, riding alongside his father in search of a chupacabra. He hadn't even realized it was Christmas until late in the day when they'd stopped at a saloon for something to drink.

He hadn't thought much about Christmas after Sam left. This was the first time he'd bought any Christmas presents since.

Still, though, for all his grumbling, if having a family Christmas was something that would put a smile on Sam's face, it was all worth it.

: : :

It was Dean who insisted they go out on New Year's Eve, though he was unspecific about _where_ he wanted to go. Somewhere there were people, that was his only insistence. He'd tried to convince Pamela to stay long enough to go with them but she had business elsewhere, which always seemed to be the case with her.

It was not hard, however, to find a New Year's celebration in the streets of Chicago. From the moment they found themselves in the thick of the city, in fact, Dean was never without a friendly face to cheer with, or a pretty girl to make eyes at.

Sam didn't stray far from his brother's side, lest they get separated, but he also didn't get in the way of his sport for the night. Sam wasn't interested in meeting anyone for a brief liaison to ring in the new year, but that didn't mean he wasn't happy to have something to celebrate.

The streets of Chicago on New Year's Eve were damn cold, though, and Sam was buttoned right to the collar, hat on his head and fingers gloved with the new pair he'd received for Christmas. Everyone else on the street was similarly attired, but for the few already inebriated enough to not feel the full effects of the cold. Sam suspected those few - those more than few by the end of the night, likely - would be regretting that choice come morning.

It was because of this conservative state of dress, he suspected, that he didn't recognize her sooner.

"Sam? Sam Winchester?"

Sam was startled to hear his name from someone other than his brother, and whirled around immediately to see who was calling on him.

"Miss Masters?"

"Well, fancy meeting you here," she said, "all the way across the country. What are you doing in Chicago?"

"Dean and I are spending the holidays with our uncle," he said smoothly, though after what they had done for her at Jericho station, the lie probably wasn't necessary. Not that it was a lie of anything more than omission. "What are _you_ doing in Chicago?"

"This is where my brother and I ended up," she said, "once he finally arrived at the station. That's him right over there." She pointed out a young man just a few feet away, who looked over and tipped his hat at them. "Don't worry, he's not as protective as he looks."

"I wasn't worried," said Sam, giving her a tiny smile. "Should I have been?"

"Well, I don't know, do you need to be?" she said. "I guess that depends entirely on what your intentions are, Sam Winchester."

Just the thought of that, though, made his expression cloud over immediately, and it was clear from her own that she noticed. "My intentions are entirely honorable," he insisted. "I've recently lost someone."

"Oh, I'm sorry," she said instantly, though Sam could see something in her eyes when he looked. Something that suggested she might somehow have already known that. "I hadn't any idea. Is there anything I can do?" She took his gloved hand between her own just for a moment, a traditional gesture of concern.

"Thank you, but my brother's taken good care of me," he assured her, gently pulling his hand away. "As I'm sure yours is taking care of you."

"And your sister?" said Meg. "Or was she just a fiction to draw the story of the train station spirit out of me?"

Sam wondered if she already knew that too. He wondered if she'd known that all along.

"A harmless fiction," he said finally. "People are seldom forthcoming with tales when you tell them your true intentions are to... well, you're already well aware of what we do."

"Thank you for that," she said, solemn and demure. "It's a debt that I can never repay."

"We'd never think of asking," insisted Sam. "It's what we do."

"Still," she said, "my brother and I are still ever so grateful. Let me give you the address of the hotel we're staying in here in Chicago. You can call on us, you and your brother, and we can treat you to a night on the town."

"Well, that's certainly generous," said Sam, barely loud enough to be heard of the sound of the crowd spontaneously breaking into song somewhere nearby. When she handed over a calling card, he tucked it away safely in his coat pocket. "Perhaps we'll do just that."

"I hope you do," she said. "It would be nice to get acquainted under better circumstances."

"The circumstances last time certainly were not ideal," he agreed.

"My brother's calling me, I should rejoin him," said Meg, "but I'm oh so glad I ran into you, Sam. I do hope I'll see you soon."

"I'm sure you will," said Sam, patting the pocket where he stowed the card and watching as she drifted away to the young man's side, taking his arm and letting him chaperone her up the street.

A moment later he, too, rejoined his brother, whose latest lady friend had also vanished. "No luck?" he said, pressing his own scarf up closer to his throat.

"Keeping my options open," said Dean. "The night is young, as am I."

"I do hope you're not using those words to try to find yourself some loose female company for the night," said Sam. "I'm willing to bet the success rate is something lower than you're aiming for."

"Hey, no need for that," said Dean. "I just want a pretty thing on my arm at midnight, that's all. What's the matter with you? Didn't I see you with some company of your own a moment ago?"

"That was nothing," said Sam, and resolved to discuss the situation with Dean the following day and not here and now in the middle of what was perhaps the last celebration they'd enjoy for a while. "I'm not looking for company."

"No, I guess you're not," said Dean. "But come on, let's have a good time nonetheless. What do you say?"

"That's what I'm here for," agreed Sam, and let Dean pull him into the crowds.

: : :

Sam passed Dean a glass of water and waited for him to fully return to himself before beginning the discussion he'd put off the night before.

"There's something we need to discuss," he said, taking the other seat in front of the fire, warming his hands and feet by it.

"I swear, I didn't touch that girl," insisted Dean. "I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Is my cheek bruising badly?"

"You can hardly tell," Sam promised him, which he wasn't actually sure was the right or the wrong answer. "That's not what we need to discuss."

Dean held a finger up to stall him while he finished the glass of water, then wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and sat back. "All right, Sam, what do we need to discuss?"

"Do you remember that girl we rescued back at Jericho station?"

"Of course I do," said Dean. "What was her name? Margaret?"

"Right, Margaret Masters," said Sam, nodding slowly as he put his words together. "Meg. I saw her last night, Dean, in the street."

"You saw her here?" said Dean. "In Chicago? What was she doing?"

"The same thing we were," said Sam, "to all appearances, anyway. But what are the odds of that, Dean, running into her accidentally half a country away?"

"They're not very good, Sam," said Dean, "they're not very good at all. What are you thinking? Demon?"

"I don't know," said Sam. "I didn't scent sulfur on her, but if she's been riding that body across the country, there's no reason I would have. I can't imagine it's a coincidence that we'd end up in the same place at the same time once again."

"And you didn't think to tell me this last night?"

Sam reached into his pocket and pulled out the calling card, handing it over to Dean. "I doubt she knows I suspect anything," he said. "She said she and her brother would like to thank us for our daring rescue from the train."

"I was really hoping she wasn't going to tell her brother about that," said Dean, whistling low. "I'm not keen on another fist to the face so soon after the first."

"She'd never have given me the address if she knew I suspected," said Sam.

"Unless it's a fake address," offered Dean, handing the card back. Sam knew that meant he already had every detail of it memorized. "Only one way to find out."

"I'm ready to go whenever you are," said Sam. "I had a suspicion you'd be skipping breakfast."

Dean looked faintly nauseated at the thought. "We can get lunch later," he said. "Right now we have a hotel to check out."

They didn't take Meg up on the invitation of course, not yet, but with not only an address but a room number it was easy to find the hotel, and nearly as easy to find the room within it. Finding a stakeout location nearby was a little harder, but they managed to do it without resorting to a serviceman's costume or hiding behind a potted plant. The lobby was ornate and expansive, and dressed as they were, in clothes appropriate for the city, Sam and Dean didn't stand out at all.

Well, perhaps Dean's coat stood out, but with all the airship traffic to the city they probably just mistook him for a pilot. Pilots occasionally required hotel rooms as well.

The wait was tedious, but just over two hours after their arrival according to the central clock in the lobby that sounded every quarter hour, Margaret Masters and her brother - and a third young man who seemed to be a familiar acquaintance - left the hotel together without so much as glancing in Sam and Dean's direction.

"Well, that's that, then," said Sam as Dean smoothly got to his feet to follow them outside.

Ordinarily it wouldn't have been an effort to trail them out of the hotel, but an incident with a loud tourist, a luggage cart, and a porter blocked their way for just long enough that when they reached the lobby door, Meg and her brother were nowhere to be seen.

"Well, at least we've confirmed that the address she gave you was legitimate, if nothing else," said Dean. "Shall we head upstairs?"

"Let me guess," said Sam. "You've brought your lock picks with you?"

"When have you ever known me to forget my lock picks on a surveillance mission?" said Dean, pulling them just far enough out of his pocket for Sam to see. "Though I could probably sweet talk the maid into letting us in anyway."

"Let's stick with the break and enter," said Sam, hustling him along to the stairs. "I'd prefer not to be remembered here."

"Your call," said Dean, leading the way to the room.

When they got inside, though, there wasn't a single thing amongst the very sparse and very neat belongings that suggested Meg and her brother were anything other than who she said they were. In fact, there was nothing at all that even told them more about the girl than they already knew. There were no papers, no journal hidden beneath her pillow, and even their clothing was unremarkable.

They were careful not to leave any signs of their invasion, but it was not an even moderately difficult task. The maid probably left more evidence of her presence than they had.

"Something's not quite right here," insisted Dean, but whatever it was, it was nothing visible and nothing either of them could quite put their finger on.

"Something's not quite right about any of this," agreed Sam. "It's time to tell Bobby."

: : :

"So you met this girl back in California, is that what you're telling me?" said Bobby. "Did she say anything about heading here?"

"No," said Sam. "In fact, if I recall correctly her destination was Oregon, the last I spoke with her. We're a long way from Oregon."

"In more ways than one," agreed Bobby. "I don't like this one bit, boys, and I won't lie. The omens say something's in Chicago and so's she?"

"That's what we thought too," said Dean. "Our advantage here is that she doesn't know we know anything. She knows what we _do_ , thanks to a certain train-haunting spirit, but not why we're here. Sam told her we're spending Christmas with family."

"We need to figure out what she's doing," said Bobby. "You boys need to keep an eye on her best you can. I'm going to see if I can get Pamela back into town on this. If there's anyone who can get a bead on what's going on in the spirit world around these parts, it's her."

"I think that's likely the best plan," agreed Dean. The part about keeping an eye on her, at least, and he couldn't object to seeing a little more of Pamela Barnes either. "We know where she's staying, so we can tail her again if she comes out this afternoon."

"Just keep me informed, boys," said Bobby. "Don't pull a Daddy and take off after her yourselves if something happens."

"We won't unless we're forced to," said Dean reluctantly, the caveat being the only thing that allowed him to make the promise.

"That's all I can ask," said Bobby, standing up from the table. "I need to consult a few books now, boys, if you'll excuse me."

They didn't see Meg at all that day, though. Or the next. A quick consultation with the registration desk confirmed that Margaret and Peter Masters were still guests, however, so either they had somehow missed them, or they hadn't left the hotel at all during regular hours over the past two days.

"There could be a back entrance."

"There must be," said Sam, "but why would they be using it?"

"Still," said Dean. "This waiting is getting tedious. I think I preferred it when Bobby had me scouring old books for some secret arcane ritual that somehow he didn't already know."

"There must be some," said Sam, but he, too, obviously saw the futility of such a search, especially under these conditions and without a full library of arcane books at their disposal. "Very well, tomorrow we'll split our efforts, though I suspect the hotel staff is getting suspicious of our presence here."

"I would be too if I were them," said Sam. "I'll take the lobby and you can take the back alley." He didn't specify that was because he felt he fit in better in the hotel lobby; as far is he was concerned, that went without saying.

Apparently the third time was, indeed, the lucky one. In the late afternoon - just in time for an early dinner, in fact - Dean heard Sam's distinctive whistle come up the alley and rejoined him at the street corner just in time to see Meg and her brother crossing.

"First we see where they're going," said Dean, "then we tell Bobby."

It was a good plan, a solid plan. However, those were the plans that so often fell apart the fastest.

The hotel was not far from Central Station and that very quickly proved to be their destination. Of course it did. The one place in all of Chicago that Dean wanted to go the least was naturally their destination. He could only hope that Meg and her brother were merely going to meet someone, or perhaps that they simply preferred the train to airship travel.

Dean only looked away for a moment, just a single moment as someone crossed the street in front of him, but when he looked back they were gone.

"Uh, Sam?" he said. "Sam, did you see where they went?"

"I swear, they were right there," said Sam, which unfortunately meant that no, he hadn't seen any more than Dean had, perhaps distracted by the same pedestrian. "They can't have gone far, Dean. They're probably in the station."

A few moments later they turned a corner into the station themselves and sure enough there Meg was, standing against an ornate pillar and oh, so obviously waiting for them.

"Hello, Sam," she said, blinking her eyes to show an endless depth of black there. "I'm so disappointed you didn't call on us sooner."

: : :

"Dean, go get Uncle Bobby," said Sam without taking his eyes off her, but he knew there was very little chance Dean was going to do as he asked, not with this demon right in front of them, smirking like she'd been waiting for them all along.

"Oh, you're no fun at all," said Meg, tilting her head to the side and wrapping an arm around the pillar so she could lean away from it, almost playfully. "Aren't you wondering where my brother went?"

"Go back to hell," growled Dean, still, as Sam expected, right at his side. "Who is he really? Whose body is he riding?"

"Oh, he's my brother all right," she said. "Not the body, though. Actually, I have no idea _whose_ body that is. That's funny, I just never thought to ask."

"Yeah, that's real funny," said Dean. "Sam, I hope your Latin isn't rusty."

"Look at the time," Meg said, grinning at them and letting go of the pillar. "I really must be going. If you want to exorcise me, you're going to have to be faster than that. I have a flight to catch."

"Of course you do," said Dean, and reached to grab a fistful of her coat but she'd already melted back into the crowds of the station, out of their reach but still in sight. "No time to go get Bobby, Sam, you know we need to go after her."

Sam did know that, and felt a sudden shot of sympathy for Dean, for what they were about to do. It was no accident they were here, he was sure. In fact, he thought he might've even been the one to tell Meg that Dean wasn't fond of heights.

Dean wasn't hesitating though, grabbing hold of Sam's lapel and tugging him into the sea of people, never once letting go. It was probably easier that way, not giving himself an opportunity to think about it as they headed straight for the elevators up to the docking platform, right behind Meg. They weren't swift enough to catch the one she'd slipped onto, but they squeezed into the next, alongside what was obviously the crew of one of the airships, attired in matching uniforms and speaking a language Sam wasn't sure he'd ever even heard before, let alone was able to understand.

"You're armed, right?" he said, softly but also hoping that the language barrier was mutual. They were squeezed into the back, far enough from the elevator operator to be unheard, but other bodies were squeezed nearby.

"Of course," said Dean. "Aren't you?"

"Of course," said Sam in return, and while it was true now it mightn't have been a couple of months ago, which was certainly a sobering thought. The ride was a long one, the spire tall enough to keep the air traffic from disrupting the flow of the city, and while Dean seemed to be quite calm during it, Sam didn't miss the tap of his foot. The real test could come when he was able to look down from the top.

At least the crowds were thinner here, people intent on their destinations. There were corridors in four directions, each leading out to one of the docked airships, and Sam desperately hoped that his height gave him the advantage of finding Meg before she disappeared down one of them.

"Sam, this way," said Dean, beating him to it. The steel frame creaked below them, and for a moment, just a fleeting second, Sam saw Dean close his eyes against the creak and sway. Dean had to know, as someone fascinated by the construction of things, that the way was perfectly safe and supported, but what he knew and what his gut was telling him weren't necessarily the same thing. At least the fear did not slow him down, though he didn't once look anywhere but straight ahead.

Keeping his eyes on their target was, in this case at least, more of a benefit than usual.

"How are we going to get past the identification checker?" Sam asked him as Meg made her smooth way through, a benefit of her actual form.

"Just leave that to me," said Dean and when they reached the automaton stationed to block their way, Dean reached out and tweaked something under his arm, something Sam couldn't see, and it let them pass without incident.

"How did you--?"

"Haven't paid to travel in years," said Dean flippantly, though he looked around as though expecting a further obstacle. Sam, too, would have expected more than one inanimate device securing the way into the airship. "Have I mentioned yet how much I hate this?"

"You didn't need to," said Sam, moving in behind him single file as they reached the enclosed ramp to the gondola, empty of crew. "Thank goodness this is a freighter. They usually don't dock at the spires."

"You think that's going to make this easier?" said Dean, closing his eyes once again as they swiftly boarded, the riveted wooden ramp swaying slightly under his feet.

"No, I think that means there will be fewer civilians to concern ourselves with," said Sam. "Try to look like you belong here."

"That's not going to be a problem for me," said Dean, "you're the one who should worry about fitting in, Sammy. Which way do we go?"

"She wanted us to follow her here," said Sam. "She's going to take advantage of the height."

"Right," said Dean, visibly wincing. "Where's the best view?"

"On a merchant ship?" said Sam. "The pilothouse, most likely."

Dean jerked his head to the left. "This way, then," he said, hand on the long brass rail of the corridor, steadying himself. "Unless you know of a way to flush them out."

"I watched airships, I didn't ride them," said Sam. He'd been in the gondola of a passenger ship a time or two, but that was the extent of his experience.

The point turned out to be moot, however, as they turned a corner and were suddenly face to face with a surprised and suspicious crew member.

"We were just--"

"Stowing away on a merchant vessel bound for the Republic of India," he said, reaching behind him for something that couldn't be good. "The captain will want to see the pair of you."

"Yes!" said Dean immediately. "That is, of course, we understand, you need to take us before the Captain. Absolutely. We won't put up a fight."

That didn't make him any less suspicious, or any less rough as he took them each by the arm and headed in the completely opposite direction. Sam tried to take note of everything they passed, expecting that at some point in the near future they were going to have to get _off_ the ship again.

The pilothouse was a long room bordered on each side by thick glass windows that allowed a view of the clouds and city from all directions. In the center of the room was the steering implementation and sprouting from it, heading up to the ceiling and spreading out in all directions, were the pipes that regulated the gas flow in the bladder of the ship.

"Captain," said the man, drawing the attention of the woman standing by the rotariscope, uniformed from neck to toe. "I found these men skulking in the corridor."

She said nothing, but then she didn't need to. Her posture and expression said everything.

"Gentlemen," he said, "if you can indeed be called gentlemen, if you cower before Captain Jaipal Kaur she may choose to grant you leniency."

"Christo," said Dean, which was by any definition pretty far from cowering, but neither the captain nor the officer who'd brought them in reacted.

"Give me one good reason I shouldn't have you arrested," she said.

"We just lost our way," insisted Dean. "I should've known this wasn't the _Victoria's Pride_ when the automaton didn't recognize our tickets."

She looked completely unimpressed. "You're going to have to try harder than that. What is this, espionage? Thievery?"

"Neither, I swear," said Dean. Well, it was a little espionage, but not the kind she was thinking of. "Okay, we're just visiting the city and we just wanted to take a look around. We meant no harm."

This time she clicked her tongue, still disbelieving. "If you don't wish to tell me what you're doing, I'll be forced to draw my own conclusions."

"I swear to you," said Dean, "that we mean no harm to yourselves or your cargo. Our presence here is unrelated to your business."

"Nothing that happens on my ship is unrelated to my business," she said, and might have gone on to berate them further but at that moment they were interrupted by another uniformed man.

"Captain, the shipping relay has stopped moving. We've lost contact with the cargo hold."

"Friends of yours?"

When Sam and Dean looked at one another, she took it as the confirmation they'd refused to voice. "Have these men arrested and I'll see to it."

"No, wait!" said Dean. "All right, here it is, the absolute and honest truth. We tracked a demon on board. All right? And now she's probably in your cargo hold doing God only knows what. You can doubt us if you must, and have us arrested and taken off the ship, or you can believe us and let us help you."

"What kind of demon?"

"The kind that killed our mother."

She narrowed her eyes at both of them, but whatever she saw this time somehow satisfied her.

"No one would come up with that outrageous a story and present it as truth unless they wholly believed it," she said finally. That, and nothing made Dean spine snap straighter than when he mentioned that night. "Sandeep, man the pilothouse. Harsharan, we'll join you at the cargo doors in a moment."

Both men obeyed her orders immediately, and with a last long look at the Winchester brothers, the captain stalked over to a locked brass cabinet and opened it with a key that hung around her neck. Inside was a vast and unexpected array of weaponry.

"You're remarkably well armed," said Dean, sounding as surprised as Sam felt.

"There's a pirate problem over the Pacific," she said succinctly, hauling out a pair of narrow, pre-loaded projectile devices and handing them over.

"Thanks," said Dean, "but we're already armed."

"Unless you want to ignite the entire ship, I would suggest you don't fire those," she said, her tone calm but her words terrifying.

Dean visibly gulped. "This is a hydrogen ship?"

"Most of the Indian merchant fleet is lifted by hydrogen," she said. "If you have anything else on your person that might spark, may I suggest you remove it? Theft and espionage are not the only reasons that trespassers are discouraged aboard the _Gahina_."

Sam was carrying nothing, but Dean handed over a box of matches with an only slightly shaky hand.

After stowing them safely in an airtight lockbox, she armed herself as well as them with the arrow-like projectile weapons and led the way out of the pilothouse. As they headed down the dim, enclosed corridor, Sam had to wonder, while they were once again facing down a demon, where the hell was their father?

: : :

The door to the cargo hold, thin but sturdy in order to not increase the payload of the ship any more than necessary, was wide open. But that in itself wasn't alarming; as cargo was currently being offloaded via aeroconveyance, an open access point was to be expected. What was more alarming was what they found inside.

"Well, if it isn't the Winchester boys." Apparently, the demon Miss Masters was not going to prove herself hard to find. "Did you get lost on the way?"

"We just stopped to catch up with a few friends," said Dean, raising his weapon. "Nice to see you again, Margaret."

"Meg, please, we don't go for formalities around here," she said, her gaze drifting to Captain Kaur. "Ah, yes, we expected you might find yourself up there." The doors closed behind them, and there was the sound of a complicated locking mechanism grinding into place. "I see you've met my brother."

The man whom Captain Kaur had addressed as Harsharan gave them a slow grin and crossed the room to stand at his sister's side.

"His other suit is being laundered," she explained coolly.

"Christo," spat Dean, and her eyes flashed a fathomless black.

There was no hesitation at all. The moment Meg was revealed as truly, inarguably inhuman, Captain Kaur raised her weapon and fired, sending a metal bolt straight into Meg's shoulder. She jerked back, her skirts flaring as she stumbled, but made no sound to show that she had been hurt by the weapon.

"That wasn't very nice," she said, yanking it out and dropping it to the floor, ignoring the blood that seeped down into her corset. "I haven't even introduced you to all my friends yet."

Sam shot his eyes sideways at Sam and hoped he remembered his exorcisms better than Dean did, though just in case he began running through the Latin in his head.

The cargo hold was worse than the pilothouse, by far. The pilothouse at least had sealed windows that Dean could assume would keep him safe from the ground below. The cargo hold had no such protection, the side where the aeroconveyance shipping volley operated wide open to the winds and the world.

"Come meet Max," she said, as a wiry young man stepped out from behind a stack of tea crates poised to be sent down the aeroconveyance but never loaded. "This poor boy has such a sad tale to tell. Maybe you know it already. Young boy loses his mother at the age of six months in a terrible fire."

"Another one?" murmured Sam.

"Oh, haven't you figured that out yet?" said Meg. "I'm sure it's only a matter of time. Poor Max here, though, he didn't have a daddy to watch over him. We plucked him right out of an orphanage a few years ago, didn't we, Max?"

Max didn't say anything, but a knife that had been mounted on a beam near the crates to aid in their opening suddenly came loose from its bindings and floated in the air between them.

"You didn't think you were the only special little boy out there, did you, Sam?" said Meg. "But your visions aren't as useful as _this_ , are they?"

"This is where it all happens," said Sam. "This is what I saw, Dean."

"Now's a fine time to figure that out," said Dean with a grunt. "You did notice there's a knife in the air pointed at us, right?"

"I did notice that," said Sam.

"I'm glad we're all caught up," said Meg. "And now that we're clear on who has the upper hand, we'd like Sam."

"Over my dead body you'll have Sam," said Dean, and didn't even ask what they wanted Sam for. He didn't _care_ what they wanted Sam for. " _Exorcizamus te, omnis immundus spiritus--_ "

One moment he was speaking, the next he felt himself sliding relentlessly across the floor towards the cargo opening. He grappled for something, anything, to stop him, but nothing did until he stumbled over a crate of tea and found himself pinned there. From that vantage point he could see that Captain Kaur was similarly pinned against the wall next to the door by the man she'd once called her officer.

Dean wondered, because wondering was just about the only thing he could do at the moment, whether he was still in there somewhere.

"I'm not going anywhere with you," said Sam, "and I have no idea why you think I would."

"But my daddy wants you to," she said. "And he's willing to go after _your_ daddy to get you."

Sam stilled. "What do you want?"

"Sam, no!" said Dean, but even just two words were hard to force out. He was sure she wouldn't be able to keep this up, though, not and taunt his brother at the same time. He didn't have a lot of experience with demons but Bobby'd made sure they'd all done their research.

"Just you," she said. "That's not asking too much is it?"

"And you had to get us up here to get me?" said Sam. "Was that really a necessary part of this plan?"

"You don't get to know all parts of the plan, Sam," she said, crooking a finger at him. "Come with us and everyone else gets to go."

"I find it difficult to believe you," he said, glancing towards Dean, just for a moment. A few more moments and Dean was going to be able to... yes, there, a crack in her resolve and Dean was able to break free of her telekinetic hold. Captain Kaur, however, had no such experience to be able to handle the demon herself, and since she was the nearer he stumbled across the floor, regained his balance, and pulled a flask of holy water out of his coat to send directly into Harsharan's eyes.

They flashed an ugly black but Jaipal was immediately released, and just as quickly raised her weapon again.

"Wait," said Dean. "Your shipmate is still in there."

She didn't fire, but she kept her weapon trained on his chest as he hissed away the pain of the holy water. By the steadiness of her hand and the unflinching resolve in her eyes, Dean had to wonder just how many pirates she'd fended off. He handed her the holy water to hold in her other hand, a much more effective weapon in this particular fight.

"There's more where that came from," said Dean, and started all over again. " _Exorcizamus te, omnis immundus spiritus, omnis satanica potestas, omnis incursio infernalis adversarii, omnis legio, omnis congregatio et secta diabolica, in nomine et virtute Domini Nostri Jesu + Christi...._ "

He shook with every word Dean spoke, but unconstrained and untied to this body he didn't stick around to be sent back to hell. He threw his head back and opened his mouth and an oily black smoke came billowing out, massing in the air above his head before streaming straight out the cargo opening.

Dean steeled himself and rushed as close as he dared to watch where it went, but as close as he dared wasn't as close as a person could conceivably get, and he could only watch it wash over the bird-like grapples of the aeroconveyance and enter into one of the automatons on the loading dock.

Dean had never seen or heard of anyone other than a human being possessed. But times had changed since the books he read had been written, and apparently these days automatons were enough like human to substitute.

"Now why'd you have to do that?" said Meg. Dean jerked away from the hole, his heart pounding at the thought of sliding through it again, but at the back of his neck he felt the prick of the knife that had been suspended in the air. "Isn't Max a good boy?"

"Leave him alone," said Sam. "It's me you want."

"Do you even know who you are, Sam Winchester?" she said. "So you know _what_ you are?"

"I'm a Winchester," he said.

Meg never saw it coming, her attention so focused on Sam and Dean. The holy water hit her right in the face, thrown by the arm of Captain Jaipal Kaur.

" _Exorcizamus te--_ " Sam began, but Meg didn't wait around for the rest of it.

Dean felt the knife at the back of his neck drop, and at the same time heard the aeroconveyance start back to life again, the brass, clawfoot birds beginning their circular trip from the airship to the platform and back again. There was no one near the controls, but whatever telekinetic force Max possessed in order to threaten them with suspended weapons, it was more than enough to flip a switch and start a conveyor.

Meg grabbed hold of the first one she reached and let loose the brake, zipping down the line instantly, landing on the cargo platform and disappearing amongst the crates, inside the spire.

Dean automatically stepped forward to watch her go, unthinking. And then he didn't have _time_ to think before he felt himself falling, pushed by some unseen hand when he dared move just close enough to the open air.

He grabbed frantically for the cable but his fingertips just brushed it before he fell beyond reach, accelerating towards the ground with no way left to stop it. This was not how he planned to go, falling from a docked airship to be splattered all over the streets of Chicago.

He never made it that far, though. His trajectory sent him not to the ground but right into the very edge of the cargo platform instead, landing hard on one ankle. He reached for the safety cable ringing the platform and this time managed to grab hold before he slipped off this, too. When he tried to stand up, though, his ankle couldn't hold the weight, even if the rest of his injuries from the fall were, at the moment, easy to ignore.

It didn't matter, though. Meg and Max were nowhere to be seen.

: : :

While Captain Kaur dealt with the station authorities - no mean feat considering they'd narrowly avoided an airship explosion and spilled a fair amount of blood in the cargo hold and on the platform - Sam raced off the ship and sprinted down to the cargo platform, ignoring every single uniformed authority that tried to stop him. That is, until Bobby Singer was suddenly right in front of him, grabbing him by both shoulders and stopping him in his tracks.

"Where's your brother?"

"He fell," said Sam shortly, and knew his expression had to be as frantic as he felt when instead of asking any more questions Bobby just let him go and followed when Sam dashed past him and down the corridor.

The way onto the platform wasn't clear, nor was it easy. It wasn't generally open to the public, and as an open-air space with precious cargo, it was more heavily monitored than the passenger corridors. There were not only automatons to bar his way, but station guards and locked doors.

Sam didn't care about any of that.

Drawing on a couple decades of knowledge he'd never entirely forgotten, he picked locks, evaded guards and dodged workers in his relentless drive towards his brother. And what he didn't get though cleanly, Bobby took care of right behind him.

Dean was sitting upright when they finally burst onto the platform, what felt like an hour later but could only have been minutes, since no one had even come to offer Dean assistance yet. Sam pushed past the remaining automatons, still working despite the interruption, stumbling to his knees at Dean's side.

"Hey, Sam," he said. "I lost them."

"I thought I lost _you_ ," said Sam, dropping to his knees next to him and pressing a hand over Dean's heart.

"Bobby?" said Dean, his eyes fixing on something past Sam's shoulder. "How did you get here?"

"When we heard there was a ruckus at Central Station I knew it had to be you boys," said Bobby. "Pamela's holding down the fort right now, in case you showed up back there before I got to you. Didn't we have a talk about letting me know before you went off willy nilly after these demons yourselves?"

"There was no time," said Dean. "If we came to get you they would've lost us."

"Yeah, and I'll bet they were counting on that," said Bobby. "Can we move you, Dean, or do I need to go find you a doctor? I'm sure the station medical unit will be here any moment."

"I can't walk," said Dean, though it looked like it pained him on more than a physical level to admit it. "But I can move if you help me."

"Nevermind that, I'll carry you out," said Sam, reaching to put an arm under Dean's knees.

"You'll do no such thing!" said Dean. "You guys should be going after Meg, she's getting away."

"She's already long gone, Dean," said Sam remorsefully, hand resting on Dean's knee but not under it. "No doubt she had her escape planned from the beginning."

"Just _try_ ," said Dean, but Sam shook his head. It was too late.

: : :

Dean's ankle hurt like a sonofabitch, but once he came back to himself that just served to make him sharper. He looked at every damn one of those automatons, muttering "Christo" under his breath, but the one harboring a demon had gotten away, or more likely the demon had hopped to a more hospitable host.

Sam and Bobby had backed off for the moment, but the way they were conferring with one another, Dean had the feeling it had more to do with his current condition than the hunt.

He was going to have to let Sam carry him out of there, unless he wanted to deal with a lot of questions he didn't want to have to answer, but he grabbed these last few minutes of dignity while he could.

His ankle wasn't the only thing that hurt; pain radiated from his chest too, particularly when he moved the wrong way, and he suspected that he had a broken rib or two again. Nothing he couldn't endure, but nothing he wanted to either.

He dared a glance over the edge of the platform that held him, braced against a support and in no danger of going anywhere despite the open air and the wind, and looked up, not down. Looked up at the airship he'd fallen from and in that moment could see with absolute clarity that a straight fall from that open door could never have landed him on this platform. It wasn't possible.

"Just let me carry you down to catch a taxicab," said Sam, interrupting Dean's thoughts.

But as Dean gave in and let himself be lifted, he took the opportunity to really look at his brother, and wonder if he and Max Miller had even more in common than they thought.

"Don't worry," said Sam, mistaking his expression for the confusion of pain. "We'll be home soon."

: : :

"No offense, Bobby, but you're just not as pretty as my other nurse," said Dean when Bobby pushed the door open to check on him. "Maybe if you put a dress on."

"Your other nurse is back on the road again," said Bobby, not telling Dean anything he didn't already know. Pamela'd said her good-byes last night already, heading to Milwaukee this time, or so she'd said.

"Well, I guess the omens were right," said Dean, "and we were the ones who were wrong. Dad never showed."

"No, I don't suppose he did," said Bobby, refilling Dean's water glass from the jug, but he didn't meet Dean's eyes, not even once he was done.

"Was he here?" Dean demanded, grabbing for his arm. "Was our father here, Bobby?"

"If he was, I didn't see any sign of him," said Bobby, shaking off Dean's hand, "but after what you boys told me about what that demon Meg said, I did some checking around. It looks like there was a house fire not all that different from yours just a few days ago."

"So that's what you think the omens were pointing at," said Dean, "and not our little encounter with Meg and her friends."

"Omens just aren't that specific," said Bobby, "and we don't have any proof this house fire was even related. There was nothing left for me to find when I went to take a look."

"We could've used an extra damn set of hands up on that airship," said Dean.

"Neither of the demons you encountered is the demon your father is looking for," said Bobby, seeming reluctant about every word out of his mouth. "The one he's looking for is the one who sits above them."

"Whatever that son of a bitch is doing, it's not sitting," said Dean. "I can't believe this."

"Dean--"

"He was here and he didn't see me? I almost died and he _didn't come_?"

"We don't know he was here, Dean," said Bobby, "and if he was, he probably saw he was late to the party and that you were already in good hands. You know that father of yours better than anyone. He's got it in his head that you need to be separated right now, and it takes a lot to get a notion out of your father's head."

Dean looked away fiercely, unwilling to let Bobby - or anyone - see the expression that no doubt reflected the betrayal he felt at his father's absence. Yes, maybe he had a good reason, but that didn't mean Dean didn't want him _here_.

"So what the hell do we do now?"

"You stay in that bed and don't go anywhere unless you want me to have to bring the doctor in again," said Bobby. "You don't want to lose a limb to infection, or worse."

"I'm not going to lose a limb," said Dean. "I've got cracked ribs, a sprained ankle, and--"

"Enough cuts and bruises to make you look like the loser in a prize fight," said Bobby. "I'll bring you up some more research materials. We have a lot to go through."

Dean couldn't argue that they had more to research than ever, even though his gut was telling him he needed to get up out of that bed and go. Staying still had never been something he was any good at.

"So what she said about the fires, that's real?" said Dean. "That happened to more than just Sammy?"

"It looks like that's one of the final things your father is tracking," said Bobby. "Not just the signs of a demon, but the signs of what he left behind. Burnt nurseries, burnt mothers, and burnt homes."

"Jesus Christ," Dean swore. "And Sam? How's he doing? He won't tell me anything."

"He's grappling with some pretty tough truths right now," said Bobby. "Give him some time, Dean, and let him fuss over you. He needs that right now."

"So there's something different about him, and it's not just these visions," said Dean.

"There may well be," said Bobby, "but he's still your brother. And right now you still need your rest. I'll bring those things up after you get some sleep."

"That's more of a threat than a promise, you know!" Dean called after him, but the truth - the truth he was sure Bobby knew as well as he did - was that Dean would do almost anything right now to stave off his helpless frustration.

: : :

They passed another week in Chicago while Dean's injuries healed; Dean would have gone off after two days, ankle be damned, but without a clear idea where they were heading Sam made him stay abed longer while he had the opportunity. Future chances might be few and far between.

"Look, see?" said Dean, hobbling down the stairs on the cane that Bobby had fashioned for him, half support and half weapon. "I can walk just fine."

"You can walk like an old man," said Sam, but he knew it was the best he was going to get. When Dean felt well enough to go, they would be going.

"You're the old man," Dean muttered as he made it down the rest of the stairs and headed straight for the fire.

"Boys, I hope you're decent, we have a guest," announced Bobby, and that was all the warning they got before Pamela Barnes joined them in the parlor.

Pamela seemed to come and go from Bobby's life, and while Sam, strictly speaking, wasn't too well bred to ask Bobby flat out whether or not she was coming around purely for business, he resisted the urge. There were some things he'd probably be happier not knowing, idle curiosity or not.

"Good to see you on your feet again, Dean," she said. "Or foot, as the case may be."

"Both feet," insisted Dean. "One's just more useful than the other at the moment. Back from Milwaukee already?"

"Now why would I stay in Milwaukee when you boys are waiting for me here in Chicago?" she said. "You might as well have a bow wrapped around you. Bobby, you got a kettle on for tea? It's nippy out there."

"Nippy's an understatement," said Bobby, "but then I think you might have too many layers on to notice. I've always wondered, if you stripped all of them off, would there be anything left of you?"

"Why, Bobby Singer," she said. "Are you saying you want to strip all my layers off me?"

Bobby turned tail and went to make the tea, and Sam guessed that answered that.

"So," said Pamela, "you boys are sitting here wondering where to pick up the trail, aren't you?"

"You don't have to be a psychic to know that," said Dean, hobbling over to a chair to sit down. Another couple of days and he probably wouldn't be hobbling anymore. "We've been trying to figure that out for almost two weeks."

"I wish I had a clearer answer for you," she said, finding her own seat, but not before she moved around behind Sam's back, brushing a bit of imaginary lint off his shoulder as she did. "Have a seat and I'll give you what I've got."

Sam made sure Dean was situated first, earning himself a not-unexpected thump on the shoulder for his trouble. It was warmer by the fire anyway, and it was definitely a winter day in Chicago.

"Let me tell you," she said, "nobody's really talking these days. If I didn't know better, I'd think they'd all gone into hibernation for the winter."

"Sometimes I think bears are the smart ones," said Dean, propping his feat up closer to the flames.

"From what I can gather, though, you boys are in for another airship adventure.

"People," said Dean, "are not meant to fly. Does that mean we're supposed to sit tight here in Chicago?"

"No, no," she said, closing her eyes as she shook her head, then cocked it to the side like she was listening to something. "That's no lake, that's definitely the big, wide ocean. Lots of people and lots of ocean. It looks like you boys are heading for the coast."

"Of the three other airships docked at the spire, two were headed for New York and one for Boston, before heading overseas," said Sam. "Our working theory is that they escaped onto one of those."

"It's a pretty sound theory," said Dean, "but it didn't help us when I wasn't even able to leave my bed."

"They want me, Dean," said Sam, "and I'm pretty sure they want us to follow them."

"Into another trap?" said Dean. "Thanks, but falling out of an airship is a once in a lifetime event for me, if it's all the same to you."

"If they wanted you so badly, wouldn't it be easier to possess you?" said Pamela. "Not that I'm encouraging that in any way."

Sam reached into his pocket and pulled out a charm, one he'd never stopped carrying since he was a teenager. "They can't," he said, showing it to her. "Unless they get this off me. I wish I knew what they wanted me for, though."

"It's got to be something to do with your...."

"Visions?" supplied Pamela. "They're not exactly a secret, boys. Not to me, anyway."

"Or maybe it's just something to distract us from what's really important," said Sam. "They know Dad's after their... father, or whatever he is. And they know we're after them too. They're running scared, Dean. I think they tried to draw us out here in Chicago because we were getting close to the real mark. Or he was."

"Using us as bait to distract Dad," said Dean, nodding slowly. "And it might have worked."

"We don't know that he was here, Dean," said Sam. "Maybe he just knew that _we_ were."

"I bet he knows that Bobby is."

"Bobby's been consulting with every hunter in the area," said Pam. "He's not exactly keeping a low profile here in the city."

Still, the visions - and whatever other abilities might come with them, which Sam was trying hard not to think about - weren't something that felt altogether natural to Sam. Maybe trying to separate him from Dean was all a ploy, but that didn't mean they didn't know something about his abilities that he didn't.

"Well, if the spirit world is telling us to head for the coast, who are we to argue?" said Dean. "And where the demons go, so goes our father, it seems."

"I've learned not to count on finding Dad anywhere we think he's going to be," said Sam, "but that's the best lead we've got."

"And we're _not_ flying," said Dean firmly. "I don't care how fast that gets us anywhere. If I never leave the ground again, it'll be too soon."

"Nobody said we're flying anywhere."

"She said airship adventure," said Dean, looking faintly green at the prospect. "I suspect 'adventure' might've been a euphemism."

"I think you're right that we should keep to the ground on this one anyway," said Sam. "We're still not entirely clear on a destination."

"Unfortunately, I've given you all I have," said Pamela. "Those demons of yours aren't the only ones running scared these days. No one in the spirit realm seems to want to talk about it all that much. Never met a more closed-mouthed bunch of spirits. But if you want my best guess, I'd say New York."

"I hate New York," said Dean. "Nothing good ever comes out of New York. Except burlesque shows."

"If we kill this demon in New York, maybe you'll be changing your tune," said Sam. "We're closing in on them. On them and on Dad. If we stay in touch with Bobby and keep tabs on the weather patterns, we can do this."

"And with any luck we'll run into that father of ours on the way," said Dean. "Damn stubborn bastard."

"Boys, boys," said Pam. "Don't you know there's a lady present?"

"Really? Where?" said Dean, giving her ass a friendly smack. "You staying in Chicago with Bobby?"

"We're heading back to Dakota as soon as the two of you move on," she said. "You're the only reason he's hanging around now and the both of you know it."

"So you're going back with him, are you?" said Dean, watching out of the corner of his eye as Sam's fingertips brushed over a fresh scorch mark at the hem his coat, just within his reach where it was hanging near the fire to dry. Not that it had looked all that pristine in about two thousand miles.

"Sounds like you think that's your business, Dean Winchester," she said. "Be careful when you ask questions like that. One day I might just answer them."

"One day, I might want to know," said Dean, winking at her. "Well, I'm all but fit to travel now. What do you say, Sammy? We pack up Tessa in the morning and start heading east?"

"I'll start putting our things together tonight," said Sam.

He wished they had more to go on, but at least they had a rough destination in mind now, and a system in place to find a new one if need be. If there was demon activity in the northeast, the Winchester boys would be on top of it.

With any luck, all three of them.

: : :

It happened in the middle of the night, which it hadn't since.... But Sam knew it was no dream this time. He woke up shaking and sweating, sitting bolt upright in his bed. A moment later Dean was at his door, light in hand and looking as shaken as Sam felt.

"You shouted my name, Sam," he said, looking him over quickly and frowning. "If you say you saw me falling again I'm never leaving this house."

"You weren't falling," Sam said quickly, leaning forward with his head in his hands and trying to will the pain away. "We were in a city, lots of people, somewhere I've been, I think."

"You've been a lot of places, Sammy," said Dean. "Could it have been New York?"

"I could smell the ocean."

"That's not the first smell I think of when it comes to New York, but okay, it could fit."

"And there was someone else there. A girl."

"Meg?"

"I don't know. Maybe," said Sam. "That's it, Dean. That's all I've got." And he couldn't be sorry for it, not when his head didn't seem like it could take any more than it was already taking. "Could you bring me some water?"

He must have looked rough because Dean didn't even argue, just disappeared out of his doorway, light and all, and returned a couple of minutes later with a glass of water that he set at Sam's bedside.

"So it sounds to me like Pamela had it right," he said, sitting down in the chair next to the bed. "Can I ask you something, Sam?"

"Since when do you hesitate?" he said, sipping the water slowly. His throat stung as it went down, and he wondered just how loudly he'd shouted.

"Do you think Dad was really here in Chicago?"

"I don't know," said Sam. "Is it better or worse if he was?"

"I don't know. Both," said Dean, elbows on the armrests and folding his hands comfortable in front of himself. "He's wrongheaded about this whole thing, Sam, and he's going to get himself killed."

"Not if we catch up with him first and have his back," said Sam. "I want to be the one to kill it, Dean. I want to be the one to send this demon back to hell."

"We all want to be the one to kill it," said Dean, and it was hard to say who among the three of them deserved it the most. "All right, if you're done with your hollering, I'm going back to bed."

"It's over," said Sam, breathing a sigh of relief as the pain really started to subside. It would likely linger at the back of his head all night, though, which didn't make for a restful sleep.

"Good," said Dean, pushing himself up out of the chair and grabbing the lamp again.

"You didn't bring your cane," Sam noted as Dean walked back across the room to the door.

"See?" said Dean. "Fit as a fiddle and ready to be back on the road in the morning. Get some more sleep, Sammy. You're going to need it."

 

_Defiance, Ohio_

It was Sam, of course, after all the fuss that had been made about Dean's injuries, who ended up falling ill while they were on the road. While in his head he thought perhaps it was for the best, that even though they were days outside of Chicago now Dean could still use the rest to finish healing, the cough that rattled his chest seemed a large sacrifice to make.

"You certainly do go to great lengths to keep from having to sleep on the ground in wintertime," said Dean, feeling Sam's forehead with the back of his hand and frowning.

"I go to great lengths to keep from having to sleep on the ground in summertime too," admitted Sam, feeling his voice grate through his throat, "but not these lengths."

It was merely a cold, one of many he'd had over the course of his life, but he also knew how quickly a cold could become something more serious when ignored. As did Dean, or he'd never have agreed to the hotel room.

Or maybe he would have, as a way to get himself some much needed rest without having to admit to needing it.

"It's a good thing we don't have anywhere to be in a hurry," he muttered with a grunt, sitting back down in a chair next to the bed and reaching for their father's journal, which never strayed far from his person. "Do you need anything?"

Sam shook his head and leaned back against his feather pillow, and the soft bed really did seem to make his body ache a little less. Which he knew Dean knew, which was why they'd stopped despite all of Dean's grumbling about the delay and the expense. He would've done it even if Sam had never asked. Which, now that he thought back on it, he wasn't entirely sure he actually had.

"Just talk to me," he said, "until I fall asleep. What are you up to in the journal?"

Dean put his foot up, and Sam tried not to smile in satisfaction, a task made easier by the fact that smiling - like nearly everything else - hurt enough to not be worth the bother.

"Ghost ship up near Boston," said Dean, flipping a page. "Apparently it's hard to fire rock salt at a ship without a canon." He flips back again, then forward. "No date. Do you remember this hunt, Sammy?"

"He didn't often tell me what he was doing," said Sam, the words drawing a cough out of him. "Neither of you did."

"Well, you made it pretty clear you didn't want to know," said Dean. "I don't remember ever being in Boston. We must have been staying somewhere else then. Maybe Pastor Jim's church."

"We stayed a lot of different places," said Sam, closing his eyes. "He could've left us anywhere."

"Sammy, you know he didn't--"

"You know he did," said Sam, and coughed again. "Tell me about the ghost ship."

Dean sighed heavily, but he settled in more comfortably, obviously planning to stay put for a while, and flipped up a newspaper clipping to read what had been written underneath. "Well, what do you know, he _did_ get his hands on a canon. I'll bet that was sure something to see."

Sam really wasn't sure he wanted to know what his father would've done after getting his hands on a _canon_. "Did it work?"

"To disperse the spirit? Sure did," said Dean. "He had to round up some artifacts to get rid of it, though. He should have brought me along on that one; I always was great at sneaking into people's homes."

"I'm sure he had his reasons," said Sam.

"Hush, don't talk," said Dean. "Jesus, Sammy, _I_ hurt when you talk. Drink your tea before it gets cold."

"If you don't want me to talk, keep reading," said Sam, and sat up far enough to take a careful sip. It was already cooling, but he could taste that Dean went to the trouble to put lemon in and he almost smiled.

Dean flipped the newspaper clipping back down, glanced at it, then flipped it up again with an almost imperceptible shrug. "A ghost ship is still about the people and not the boat itself," he said, obviously paraphrasing their father's notes. "It's just a different kind of manifestation. Like that ghost locomotive when we were kids, do you remember that?"

"Though you didn't want me to talk," said Sam, sipping his tea again.

Dean grunted and flipped the page. "Looks like Dad only ever encountered the one. Well, it's not as though we were out at the coast often, though you'd think there might be one haunting the Mississippi."

"Don't tempt fate, Dean," said Sam.

There had to be more there, more not only about the case their father had worked but about their father himself, his insights, his life when he'd left his children behind. But either Dean didn't want to talk about it, or he thought Sam wouldn't want to hear about it. Perhaps both.

Sam cleared his throat again, tried to make his voice sound like less of a croak. "Did you ever find anything in there about what you think you saw?"

"Shhh," said Dean again, and for a moment Sam thought he wasn't going to answer until he finally shook his head. "I know what I saw, Sam. The demon possessed that automaton. There are references to demons possessing people and animals before, but this is something new."

But it made sense to Sam, in a twisted kind of a way. They made their own people, and demons found a way to use their creations against them.

"Guess we'd better update the journal, huh?" he said, but Sam knew it would be going into his own, not his father's. Dean hadn't made a single mark in his father's journal since the day he'd received it.

"Just keep reading," said Sam, setting his tea back down the bedside table. "You've got to keep me entertained for at least a couple more days."

Dean made a show of sighing heavily at him, but Sam had a feeling he really didn't mind.

 

_Harrisburg, Pennsylvania_

Dean had to stop to top up the water and kerosene midway through Pennsylvania, and while he was paying the distributor for the fuel Sam browsed through a copy of the local paper, dated two weeks earlier and currently being used to mop up grease on a wooden tabletop.

"Madame Rushkin," he said, "descended from European royalty, invites you to a séance in her home--"

"Oh no," said Dean, "do not read that to me, Sam, you'll just make me want to do something about it, and no good can come of that."

" _Descended from European royalty_ ," scoffed Sam, torn paper still in hand. "Aren't they all?"

"I mean it, Sam," said Dean, hefting the metal jug and testing the weight with one arm. "I'm mere seconds away from tearing that paper out of your hands."

"For all of your spiritual needs," Sam said, holding the paper out of reach. "What do you think, Dean, do you think she can meet all of my spiritual needs?"

"I think we have a stop to make in town," said Dean, sighing heavily. "You know what Dad says about séances. Bugger them when they're frauds and bugger them twice when they're not."

"Does that mean we're going to sleep in beds again tonight?" said Sam, which Dean was beginning to suspect had been his motivation all along. Séances were kid stuff, in the grand scheme of things.

"Yes, you big baby," said Dean. "There's a low stakes game out at the Peashoot Saloon at the edge of town; I can sit in on a few hands."

"How do you even know that?" said Sam. "This is the only stop we've made in town."

"You're good at your things, Sammy, and I'm good at mine," he said. It wasn't his fault that Sam somehow never overheard the same things he did, or didn't know where to listen. "We can check out this Madame Rushkin tomorrow and figure out on which side of the line she falls."

" _European royalty_ ," said Sam with a smirk. "We used to have fun with these, remember?"

"Back when you thought anything about the job was fun," muttered Dean, but it brought a smile to his face anyway. Once upon a time they'd been two fresh-faced kids debunking the hell out of séances all over the north-east, while their father did damage control in the background. Their father hated it almost as much as Sam and Dean had a good time.

"People think kids will believe anything," said Sam. "They were always underestimating us."

"When _weren't_ people underestimating us?" said Dean, giving the gauges on Tessa's rear end a check and tweaking a few knobs in rapid succession to start her up before getting back into the driver's seat. "I suppose it might be fun, for old times' sake. Madame Rushkin, descended from European royalty, probably needs a good comeuppance."

"It certainly would be responsible to investigate her," said Sam, which was close enough to agreement for Dean. "While we're already here."

"Do you remember the time you exposed that psychic in Albany and she wasn't wearing anything but her underthings?"

"I've spent the last fifteen years trying to forget that one, Dean. Who disguises themselves as a spirit and leaves their skirts in the cupboard?"

"Someone trying to make as little noise as possible," said Dean. "I don't know about you, but I always wished she'd left the rest of it in the cupboard as well."

"Dean, you're indecent," said Sam, but as Dean got Tessa back onto the road into town, all he did was smile.

: : :

"It seems as though spiritualists are still doing brisk business," said Dean, looking up at the large and well-kept house. "Or she's in some serious debt."

"Or she really is descended from European royalty."

Dean just looked at him and snorted, not missing Sam's faint smirk at the notion. "People pay for the craziest things, Sammy," he said. "Even if this _did_ work, who'd want a ghost hanging around in your business all the time?"

"People who miss their loved ones, I suppose," said Sam. "People who don't know what's out there will go to great lengths to contact the other side."

"People on this side have no business contacting the other one," said Dean. "Not like this, anyway, and especially not when they don't know what they're getting into. Ghosts aren't people. Their loved ones are gone."

He knew perfectly well that Sam knew all of that, but he had that look in his eyes, the kind of look he had right after he lost Jess, yearning for her return, and Dean felt it couldn't hurt to say it all again.

"So what do you say we see if Madame Rushkin's afternoon session has room for two more?"

"I say that I hope it doesn't involve disrobement," said Sam, leading the way up the stairs. Dean would reserve judgment on that until he discovered just what this Madame Ruskin looked like.

She wasn't in the entry hall when they stepped in the front door (open, with a sign indicating guests should wait in the parlor), so Dean took the opportunity to snoop through everything he could get his hands on and into: drawers, cupboards and even around the picture frames. It wasn't likely that they would be wired out here in the parlor, but Dean'd seen stranger things.

It was unfortunate that Madame Rushkin entered the parlor to greet them at the exact moment Dean was fingering a photograph.

"Lovely family," he said, giving her his most distracting smile.

"Indeed," she said, taking the photo from his hands, dusting it with her kerchief and setting it back on her mantle. "Sam and Dean Murray, I presume?"

"I see our note arrived in good time," said Sam, standing to greet her. Sam, for all that Dean was used to his size and manner, did make a striking figure when people first encountered him. Madame Ruskin's tight smile became marginally warmer, at any rate.

"I'm terribly sorry to hear of the passing of your mother," she said, with practiced condolences. "I can imagine that you were both quite close to her."

"She was our whole world," said Dean. "I hope you can help us."

She sat down in an ornate armchair, one that served as something of a throne, and it was Sam's hand she reached for. "Ordinarily, of course, I would have more notice before a visit such as this, but I understand you'll be in town for a very short time."

"Only a couple of days," said Sam apologetically, "but your reputation is impeccable, Madame Rushkin, and we felt we'd be privileged to witness a manifestation with you."

When Madame Rushkin looked sharply in his direction, Dean carefully set down the vase he had been trying to oh-so-casually examine.

"I hate to disappoint you," she said, speaking to Sam but looking at Dean, "but your brother clearly has a strong magnetic temperament. It would disrupt the power of the spirits and prevent a manifestation."

Oh, Dean just bet that it would.

"Surely _one person_ couldn't disrupt things to such an extent," insisted Sam. "We've come all this way."

"Oh, contacting the spirit realm takes a great deal of delicacy," she said, patting him on the hand, more patronizing than consoling. "I truly am sorry for your loss, but I'm afraid I cannot conduct a séance with your brother in attendance."

"What if it was just me?" said Sam, shooting Dean a look, but Dean was already primed to go.

"You're absolutely certain the spirits won't manifest if I'm in the room?" said Dean. "I wonder why that is."

"There are some people who are of such a type that they interfere with a manifestation," she said. "You wouldn't understand. You need to be in tune with the workings of the spirit world to be aware of such things."

"You don't say," said Dean dryly. "So I guess that means attending the séance this afternoon is out."

"I'm afraid there's nothing I can do for you boys," she said. "Either of you boys. Now if you'll excuse me, my guests are already waiting inside, and I must get set to begin."

"You mean you're not already set?" said Dean, with imperfect innocence. Sam sighed and shook his head.

"Good day, gentlemen," she said, and all in one motion she lifted herself from the seat and swept back out of the room again.

"This was so much easier when we were kids," said Sam. "Of course, if you hadn't been caught with your fingers in the cookie jar...."

"I was admiring her heirlooms," said Dean defensively. "There's nothing suspicious about that."

"Charlatans are very good at observing the intentions of others," said Sam. "It's how they _work_ , Dean. We were made the moment she came in the room, she just played it out for propriety."

"I wouldn't have wanted to see her out of her skirts anyway," said Dean, stepping up onto a chair to check the moldings on the ceiling. "I don't see anything in here. I suppose she doesn't do any work in here after all."

"We might as well be on our way," said Sam, "unless you want to burst into her sitting room and interrupt the proceedings."

"Tempting," said Dean. "I could at least listen at the door for a little while. Did you see which room she went into?"

"I saw only as much as you did, Dean, though I suspect it won't be difficult to figure it out," said Sam. "It'll likely be the only room that's occupied, and you'll have to pick the lock if you want to get in."

They never had to find out, though. A moment later all the lights in the house flickered, and there was a suddenly and noticeable drop in temperature despite the roaring, guttering fire.

"Son of a _bitch_ ," said Dean, looking up at the ceiling. "You have got to be kidding me."

"Bugger her twice," muttered Sam under his breath, loud enough to be heard in the calm before the inevitable storm. "Do you have your magnetometer in your coat?"

"Do you really think I need it right now?" said Dean, though he felt for an inside pocket and pulled out the device. There was no time to use it, though, before there was a shriek from somewhere inside the house, and the sound of a door slamming closed, then open, then closed again.

A moment later a flood of people streamed towards the door.

"What have you done?"

"Us?" said Sam, getting to his feet calmly as though he hadn't any idea what was going on. "We were just waiting here in the parlor hoping you'd consent to speak with us when you were finished with today's session. After all, we'd come all this way."

"It was Uncle Albert," said one breathless woman, fanning herself madly. "I knew it the moment he appeared. Oh, we should never have asked him to return!"

Well, she had that much right, anyway. No one in their right mind _asked_ a spirit to return. But then, nobody was returning who wasn't hanging around already anyway.

"Why did you?" he asked uncharitably. "He have some kind of inheritance you wanted to get your hands on?"

"No, of course not!" she said with a gasp of affront. "We wanted to ask him if he'd been murdered."

The lights flickered again and Dean rolled his eyes towards the ceiling. "My money's on yes," he said. "Your Uncle Albert, what was his full name? Was he from around here?"

"Albert Montrose," she said promptly before Madam Rushkin could silence her. "Born and raised in Harrisburg."

"You're not skeptics," said Madam Rushkin, all but dropping the affected accent and looking at them with a mixture of curiosity and suspicion.

"No, ma'am, we're not," said Sam, as Dean neatly ducked around what remained of the séance - at least half of the participants had dashed right out the door and headed on their way - and used the magnetometer to detect the disturbance. It was faint, but when he eliminated the obvious natural sources it led him straight to the parlor where Madame Rushkin held her séances. There was nothing remaining of the manifestation, though, just a series of overturned chairs and, to Dean's trained eye, the telltale signs of the tricks Madame Rushkin ordinarily used to fake the manifestations.

She hadn't summoned the spirit, the spirit had just leapt upon the opportunity to show himself to the family members he'd obviously attached himself to.

He put the instrument away, made a cursory examination of the room for other evidence, and returned to the parlor. Madame Rushkin gave him an angry, wary look, but Dean decided it wasn't the moment to expose her and her tricks. Not when they had an actual spirit to dispatch.

"Whatever it was, it's gone now," he said, bringing the news he knew they hoped to hear from him. "I guess he didn't manifest in the usual way, huh?"

"No, he was far more violent than the spirits I normally deal with," said Madame Rushkin.

"Perhaps it's time to get out of the business," Dean suggested, a hint of warning in his voice. "You never know when this sort of thing might happen."

"I had been considering retirement," she said. "Spiritualism is so taxing on the body and the spirit."

Lady, you don't know taxing, he wanted to say, but he pressed his lips together and nodded his head again. "Sammy?" he said. "Are we ready to go?"

Sam had the delicate woman's hand between his own, obviously consoling her, and looked up to give Dean a nod. "Miss Montrose was just telling me of the circumstances of her uncle's death," he said. "Miss Montrose, my condolences on your loss. I hope both you and your uncle find peace."

"Oh, you're so kind, Mr. Murray," she said. "Will you be in town for long?"

Dean coughed politely, and raised an eyebrow when his brother looked.

"I'm afraid not," he said, letting her down easy. "We must be returning home. But it was certainly a pleasure to meet you, even under these unfortunate circumstances."

"Come on, Sam," said Dean. "It's time to leave these people to their business. Good day, ladies."

: : :

They approached St. Michael's Cemetery close to midnight, Tessa running silently up to the iron gate and for once not even making a rattle as Dean shut her down.

"At least this'll be a quick one," he said. "I don't suppose your acquaintance with Miss Montrose extended to her detailing just where to find Uncle Albert's grave?"

"There's never really a discreet way to ask that," said Sam. "We were lucky to get the cemetery name, and that one she just blurted out unprompted. Apparently it was a lively funeral."

"Lively because Uncle Albert made an appearance?"

"Lively because one half of the family accused the other half of being murderers right in the middle of the service," said Sam. "She mentioned there were trees nearby, but that describes nearly the entire graveyard."

"Well, let's start at one side and work our way over," he said. They were leaving tracks in the snow, just old enough to have an icy crust on top, but visitors to the graveyard were apparently not rare and theirs weren't the only tracks on the ground.

The moon was bright enough to allow them to see their way around, but not quite so bright that they didn't need some additional illumination to actually be able to read the inscriptions.

"Dean, wait," said Sam, as he was about to ignite the lantern. "Over there."

He looked up and quickly spotted what Sam was talking about: a shadowy figure near a tree towards the back of the graveyard.

"Well, hello Uncle Albert. I guess we start over there," he said, and together they moved quickly and as quietly as they could over the snow, wincing at each faint crunch of it that forecast their arrival. When they were near enough, and had memorized the location, Dean raised his scattergun and blasted a load of rock salt in the spirit's direction.

Only to hear a yelp of pain and watch a second figure join the first, leaping out from within the grave.

"Run!" one of them said, and they took off for the back fence of the graveyard at full speed, stumbling only once over an exposed root.

"What do you think?" said Sam. "Zombies? Ghouls?"

"Worse," said Dean, spitting on the ground and definitely not wasting any of his time chasing after them. "Medical students. On the bright side, if there's been a bodysnatching problem, they're going to blame Uncle Albert's disturbed grave on them.

They continued to watch as the two figures fled into the night, gait uneven as they tried to compensate for rock salt in the arse, finally scrambling over the iron fence and disappearing.

"Back to work?" Sam said finally.

"Back to work," said Dean, finally igniting the lantern and hoisting his shovel over his shoulder. The grave the students had been excavating was not Albert Montrose's - they weren't that lucky - and they made a point of roughly filling it back in before moving on. There was no sense _asking_ for trouble.

After that they systematically went from tombstone to tombstone, shining a light on each of them in turn until they found the one they were looking for."

"This is so much easier in the summertime," said Dean, moving a shovelful of snow out of their way. It was a light covering, which was better than what it might have been. "I hate winter."

"At least the grave is fresh and the weather has been relatively mild," said Sam, but that, of course, brought its own complications. "Did you bring the clothespins?"

"I hate winter _and_ fresh graves," Dean amended, and pulled one out of his pocket to hand to Sam, preparing for the opening of the coffin.

"Fresh graves are worse in the summer," Sam reminded him, and started to dig.

The stench, Dean thought when they finally broke through the body box, was still fairly incredible. But at least they made short work of the body, and thus the spirit, of Albert Montrose, and that was a success he couldn't really complain about.

 

_Allentown, Pennsylvania_

They were outside of the automobile but not yet inside the saloon when Sam felt a pain in his head so intense that he instantly fell to his knees on the dirt. His visions were certainly no comfort at the best of times, but this one seemed to be more vicious than most.

He could feel Dean touching his shoulder in a distant sort of a way, but most of his attention was on the images that were flashing in front of him. Streets full of people and tall buildings, and one particularly cavernous one that seemed vaguely familiar. He didn't have time to wonder whether he was meant to recognize it, though, because that was when the piece de resistance of the vision appeared.

His father. The father he hadn't seen in well over three years. His father with a scattergun over his shoulder, smiling at Sam like the estrangement was nothing but a memory.

He didn't miss that there was also smoke and blood and sweat, but that smile was what stayed with him as the vision finally receded and he was aware of where he really was again.

"Sam?" Dean was saying. "Sam, can you hear me? Sammy?"

"I'm here," he said, the very words - like every part of his body - painful.

"Jesus, Sammy, you really scared me there," he said, taking Sam's elbow to help him to his feet. "What was it this time?"

Sam took a moment to find his feet and clear his head, then looked straight at Dean and said, "I saw Dad, Dean. Dad was in my vision. We're going to find him."

 

_New York, New York_

"First thing we need to do is find a place to stay," said Dean, standing with his back against his automobile and looking over at Sam. "Someplace that grubby hands aren't going to be pawing all over Tessa. She's put on a lot of miles since Chicago. She could use a little pampering."

New York, unlike San Francisco or Chicago, was not a city of personal automobiles, but in some neighborhoods there were still a lot to be seen, tucked away in tiny cobblestone lanes and behind wrought iron gates. New York streets were not a place where Dean wanted to leave something so precious unattended.

"You need someplace that will board your automobile as well as your person," said Sam, "and I think you're not likely to find it within the city."

Dean was inclined to agree, but then this was New York. Surely he could find anything he really needed. It was the price of that anything that was more of a concern.

"I mended the tent when we were back in Akron, during that storm," he said finally, laying out what was probably their best option. "At least we know it doesn't have bedbugs."

Spring was rising, after all, and though the threat of cold and snowstorms still loomed, it wasn't what it had been even a month ago. Camping was no longer a torturous option.

"If you've ever considered a career in sales, I'd seriously suggest rethinking it right now," said Sam, leaning against Tessa as well as he surveyed the city across the river. "If the tent's greatest feature is that it lacks bedbugs, I might take my chances in the city."

"We need to stop and make a plan anyhow," said Dean. "I don't know where to start, and your visions aren't that forthcoming with the addresses. Or has that crazy brain of yours coughed up some more information when I wasn't looking?"

"I haven't had a vision since the last one you witnessed," said Sam, shaking his head. "And frankly, I don't want to."

"Figures that Dad would give you a bigger headache than most. You want me to try to get my hands on some morphine?" said Dean, watching him with a certain amount of brotherly concern. "That last one seemed like it did a real number on your head."

"I'm more worried that a dose of morphine will interfere with what the visions are trying to tell me," said Sam. "Though if you ask me afterwards, I'm fairly certain I wouldn't say no. The pain can be... indescribable."

"You can't just tell your brother you're in indescribable pain and not expect him to do something about it," said Dean. "I'll take care of it tomorrow. You should've said something, Sammy."

"I'm fine, Dean," he insisted. "And I'm sure I'll continue to be fine."

"Right up until your head splits open again," said Dean. There was no room for argument here. He wasn't going to force it down Sam's throat, but he was going to have something on hand, just in case. "Which don't get me wrong, I'm not encouraging. But it'd be nice to know where we're going. I don't think I've ever worked a job this blind before."

"It's not exactly a job," said Sam.

"It's not exactly not a job either," said Dean. "We're hunting something. That's a job. That's _the_ job. This is the job that we did every other job to get to."

"Yes, I suppose it is," said Sam. "Look, this is New York, you can find a dozen card games just by turning your head in the right direction, each one as anonymous as the last. Win us some money and we'll get a nice hotel, someplace you can keep Tessa."

"If we're going to be stuck in New York, we might as well enjoy the amenities," agreed Dean grudgingly. "We could take in a show, see the sights."

"It's a big city," said Sam, crossing his arms. "But somewhere in it's something we're looking for."

"We're just as likely to find it at a burlesque show as anywhere, right?" said Dean, a grin creeping onto his face in spite of him. "Maybe I don't hate New York so much after all."

: : :

The Garnet Hotel was not swank, like many of those that they passed on the streets, but it was warm and clean and offered Dean a space for Tessa so long as he let their mechanic get a good look at her. It seemed, to all involved, a fair trade. But finding one person in New York, particularly a person who didn't want to be found, definitely was the proverbial needle in the haystack.

"Maybe we're not supposed to be in New York after all," suggested Sam. "There was nothing definitively tying either Pamela's information or my visions to this spot exactly."

"I know you're tired of staying put," said Dean. "Hell, I'm tired of staying put too, and you've had a lot more practice than me at it. But let's not second guess everything now. You saw Dad in you vision, Sam, and I know all too well now that they're the real deal. And besides, did you read this morning's paper? Electrical storm kicked up on the east side yesterday out of nowhere."

"Omens," said Sam, and Dean could actually see his resolve firming. "Any other incidents to back it up?"

"Unfortunately, I don't think mutilated animals are big news in New York City, so that one's out," said Dean. "No doubt in my mind what this is, though. We've seen it too much lately, Sam."

"So we keep looking," said Sam, pacing the room. "All right. We can do that."

"No," said Dean, "tonight we go out for a little entertainment. _Then_ we keep looking. We've earned this, Sammy."

"You just want to see some women in their underthings," said Sam.

"You have no idea how long it's been," said Dean. "I should've taken Pamela up on it while I had the opportunity."

"Pamela never intended to let you so much as snap her garters and you know it," said Sam with a longsuffering sigh. "All right, we can go out but I get to pick the show. And if you've still got a hankering for female underthings after that, you can go find a kinetoscope parlor on your own and hope it has a seedy back room."

"They all have seedy back rooms, Sam," he said. "Some of them have seedy front rooms, too."

"Well, if anyone would know that, I suppose it would be you," said Sam. "Some of us have higher standards."

"All right, all right, you can pick the show. Just make it something good."

The poster outside the theater Sam chose advertised Sam Lucas as its headliner, along with the Kindle Sisters, Jack Lampkin's Magical Emporium and the Amazing Ava, the Girl who Dances with Fire.

"Acceptable?" said Sam.

"Let's just hope the Amazing Ava dances in her underskirts," said Dean, letting Sam pay for their tickets (with money, as always, from Dean's stash) and leading the way inside, straight up to the balcony and tucked up against the wall.

"I once heard of a man who can play an ocarina through his arsehole," said Dean. "Now that is something I'd like to see one day."

"This is why I get to choose the shows," said Sam.

The Kindle Sisters were cute in that precocious pre-teen way, Jack Lampkin came very close to actually drawing blood (a popular decision, from the hoots of the audience) and the resident strong man really could lift a fully attired woman with one arm, much to the chagrin of the woman from the audience who found herself in an undignified position by the end of it. But it was the Amazing Ava that really caught his attention.

"Can _you_ tell how she's doing it?" hissed Dean in his brother's direction, watching as flashes of fire appeared around her as she danced, seeming to come out of nowhere and sometimes following her motions as she dipped and turned.

"No," said Sam, sounding troubled by the fact. "There must be someone controlling the gas in the back."

"No pipes," said Dean, "and no source of ignition." He would suspect a hidden sparking device if the ignition had been, well, hidden. But even to Dean's sharp, trained eye the trick to the act was invisible.

Which was maddening because the Amazing Ava's costume was, in fact, as immodest as Dean had hoped, and the fire dance both titillating and provocative.

"You think it's worth looking into?"

"You just want to meet the Amazing Ava," said Sam.

"Consider it a perk."

They didn't stay for the airship captain's thrilling tales of adventure in the Philippine Islands, and they heard the musical stylings of Sam Lucas - just as good as Dean had always been led to believe they were - only from backstage as they hustled their way in, looking for the Amazing Ava.

"Are you allowed to be ba--?"

"I'm with the airship act," said Dean, and with his standard attire no one questioned him, the force of his personality carrying Sam along in his wake.

: : :

They found her in a dressing room, which was crowded with heavily made up girls only momentarily before every last one of them but the Amazing Ava scurried out past the Winchesters and onto the stage to perform their number.

"Unless the two of your are planning on putting on a wig and a dress, you're not allowed back here," she said as she wiped her lipstick off with a damp handkerchief.

Dean answered by closing the door behind them, which certainly got her full attention.

"I'm not as defenseless as I look," she said, shoulders square and facing them down.

"That's just the thing," said Dean. "We don't think you're defenseless at all, Ava. If that is your real name."

"No, Mr. and Mrs. Ava named their daughter 'Amazing'," she said dryly. "Five more seconds and I scream."

"No, wait," Sam interrupted. "Look, we just want to ask you a couple of questions, and they're the sort of questions that you might not want to have overheard."

"Two seconds."

"How do you start the fires?" said Sam.

At that, she just smirked and stopped her countdown. "I don't give away the secret to my act," she said. "Even the producers of the show don't know how I do it, so I don't know why you think I'm going to tell you."

"Yes, I'll bet they don't know," said Dean. "I'll bet they don't know because you're not using gas or electricity or any other scientific means in your fire dance, are you, Ava? You're doing it yourself." And with a tap to his temple as he said it, he made it clear just what 'yourself' was supposed to mean.

Sam knew they'd hit their mark when her expression closed down and her eyes grew guarded. "Who are you?"

"So we're right, then," said Dean. "Don't worry, we're not going to tell your boss."

"The other guy said you people were going to leave me alone," she said. "He said he got what he needed."

Sam felt himself go very, very still, barely able to turn his head to look at his brother. "What other guy?" said Dean finally. "Did he give you a name? Can you describe him to us?"

"No, I'm done, get out," she said. "Get out before I scream. There's a strong man out there who's just aching to do more than lift housewives on stage."

"No, wait," said Sam. "Wait, we're not... I have abilities too. I get visions. And I know a boy who's telekinetic. We're not here with bad intentions, I promise you."

"Then why so curious about my previous callers?" she said. She might not have necessarily believed him, but at least it was enough to keep her from screaming. "You sound more interested in him than me."

"We might be," said Dean frankly. "Please, what did he look like?"

"I don't know," she said. "Tall, slim, clean-shaven, brownish hair? It was a couple of years ago, and he was never particularly distinctive."

Sam hadn't realized he was hoping for one description in particular until hers didn't match his father. But then, if it hadn't been their father, then who?

"Was there anything about him, anything at all, that was memorable?" She was clearly uncomfortable with the questioning, but she hadn't yet let out the threatened scream so they persisted.

"There was one thing," she said, "but it was probably a trick of the light."

"Did it look like his eyes went black?" said Dean.

"No, not black," she said. "A gold or a yellow. It was the oddest thing."

Well, that was a new one on Sam, and apparently on Dean, too. Maybe it had been a trick of the light, and the man just another hunter noticing the same things they had. But then what hunter would promise that no others would ever bother her? Or maybe the eyes meant it was something they hadn't encountered before.

"This is going to sound like a strange question," said Sam, "but did you lose your mother when you were small?"

"How did you know that?" she said warily. "She died saving me from a fire when I was a baby."

Sam was increasingly coming to believe that a fire wasn't what they were truly saved from. Or maybe that they hadn't, in the end, been saved in time at all.

"The same thing happened to me," he said finally, as Dean stood a little taller, looked a little more watchful. "To us."

"So what am I supposed to do now?" she said. "Why did you have to tell me all of this? What does it mean?"

"We don't know," said Dean. "We don't know what it means. And you shouldn't do anything, you should just keep on doing what you do exactly how you do it. We need to go."

"Yes, I think you do," she said, swallowing hard.

"Oh, and the man you met, the one who told you he and his people were going to leave you alone?" said Dean. "Don't believe them, Ava. Be careful, all right?"

: : :

Dean intended to talk to Sam about everything as soon as they were out of the theater, finding a convenient eatery to sit in instead of taking the time to go back to their hotel, but the moment they exited they saw her. And this time she saw them, too, vanishing around a corner almost as instantly as she had appeared.

"Sam, did you...?"

"Meg," he said, and was even quicker than Dean to sprint across the street to the corner. When they arrived, though, she was completely out of sight.

"Doesn't want us to follow this time."

"Which means we must," said Sam. "The human body she's borrowing has limitations. She must be nearby still; she can't have simply vanished."

It certainly didn't seem that way, but his reasoning was sound, and so they scoured the street, looking in every doorway, on every balcony, in every alleyway, until Sam caught a glimpse of her ahead and tugged Dean in the right direction.

"Where the hell is she going?"

"I think she knows we've spotted her," said Sam, tilting his head back and looking up.

"We're not near the airship terminal," said Dean without looking. "I _know_ we're not."

"No, but I think she's heading for the one place she thinks you'll no longer be willing to follow." Dean looked up then, and saw what Sam saw, what he should've seen all along. The tallest building on the street. The tallest building in the whole damn city.

"No, Sam," he said, feeling a phantom ache in his ankle and his chest just at the thought.

But his feet were still moving, drawing him towards it, following that distant bob of uncovered blonde hair far ahead of them on the street. The last place he wanted to go was that building, but for this he would. For this he'd _scale_ it, right to the top.

If Meg thought it would stop him from catching up with her, from trapping her and extracting every bit of information about her father out of her, then she had sorely underestimated him.

"I can go alone--"

"Like hell you can," said Dean, practically snarling the words out. "If she wants to play that game, then we'll play it with her. All she'll be doing is trapping herself. You've still got that diagram that Bobby gave us?"

"For the seal of Solomon?" said Sam. "It never leaves my person, Dean."

"Good," he said. "I think we might finally have the chance to use it."

If it worked the way Bobby said it would, then Dean was going to have some fun with it. And if it didn't, well, they'd find out before they tried it on the big man himself.

"Do you think she was at the theater looking for Ava?" said Sam, grabbing Dean's sleeve again so they didn't get separated by the carriage heading up the street and right at them.

"It all adds up, doesn't it?" said Dean. "Maybe her daddy didn't really want you after all. Maybe he just wanted someone _like_ you."

"Or maybe he wants a complete set," said Sam. "I hope Ava takes our advice."

"Whether she does or she doesn't, we have bigger problems right now," said Dean.

The Singer Building stood head and shoulders above the rest of the street, looking impossibly tall when Dean looked up from the base of it. They hadn't been wrong. Meg, or someone who looked just like her, had vanished inside the doors not far ahead of them. But Dean forced his feet forward, through those doors and towards the unmanned and completely automated elevator.

She knew they were behind her. If she didn't know they were behind her, she wouldn't have come here. Dean _knew_ that, and yet somehow still, in the back of his mind, he hoped they were arriving with the element of surprise.

"What do you think the odds are that she stopped at the mezzanine?"

Sam just looked at him and pressed the switch to call the elevator, and Dean hoped that no one arrived to check for identification. He hadn't gone to the theater prepared for this kind of pursuit, after all. It seemed a little absurd, to be _standing_ in pursuit of someone, but while the stairwell was only a few feet away, scrambling up forty-some-odd floors, while feeling more productive, would ultimately just slow them down.

The forty-sixth floor - the last they could reach by elevator - was deserted when they reached it. The offices had long since closed for the day and Meg, too, was nowhere to be found.

Well, he hadn't expected her to be waiting for them, after all, but the quiet was eerie. Especially a quiet highlighted by the whistle of wind from outside the windows, whipping over the viewing balcony that wrapped around the floor. With his head, he motioned for Sam to take one direction while he took the other, but while Sam rounded the corner quickly, Dean hadn't gone more than a dozen steps before he felt something impact with the base of his skull and drive him to his knees.

"Sometimes the old ways are the best ways," came Meg's voice from behind him as Dean struggled not to see stars. "That was so much more satisfying than just pushing you around."

"Satisfy this," muttered Dean, swinging one of his legs out and catching her ankle, bringing her down to the floor as well. Not as satisfying as exorcising her back to hell, but satisfying enough.

He flipped himself over onto his back, still waiting for his vision to clear, and managed to catch her scowl as she had to pick herself up as well. And further up the dim corridor behind her, Dean caught sight of Sam returning to investigate the commotion. He tried to tell him with his eyes, in the quick look he dared himself, that he had this under control, that Sam should set the trap.

He didn't know if the message was received or not, but when he looked back again Sam was gone.

Meg didn't bother with swinging a brick at his head this time, going straight to the mind mojo, sliding him back across the floor. But not before Dean had time to slip the holy water out of his coat and splash some in her direction, keeping her from pushing him very far.

"Where are your friends this time?" he said.

"Oh, they're around," she said, but if they were around here, they'd have shown their faces by now. "How's that ankle, Dean? Still holding up, is it?"

"The ankle's fine. How's your face?"

"As lovely as ever."

"Let me see what I can do about that," said Dean, shaking his head one last time and struggling to his feet as she shook off the impact of the holy water. "There's more where that came from."

"Is that all you've got?" she said. "If it is, this is going to be child's play, Dean. You go over the railing and Sammy comes with me."

"If I go over the railing Sammy isn't going anywhere with you," said Dean, "and you know it. Was that supposed to scare me?"

"Did it work?" she said. "Are you trembling? You look as though you're trembling, Dean."

He was, but so slightly he was sure it wasn't visible, not even to a demon like Meg. He wasn't going over the railing. He wasn't going near the railing. And Sam wasn't going with her, no matter what it took.

Not that he thought that's what they were doing here. Demons lied, and they never stopped.

"Only with anticipation," he said, struggling to his feet on an ankle that remembered the pain of an earlier fall, from a much greater height. "You have no idea what you're in for."

"Oh, I think I have an idea," she said. "Where's your little brother, Dean?"

"Right here," said Sam, slamming the back of her head with the butt of his full-bore scattergun, pulled from the folds of his coat. He took her arms and Dean took her ankles and they'd moved her halfway up the corridor before she managed to push them both away from her, landing on her feet and whirling on Sam. He was ready with the holy water, catching her shoulder and neck with it. "How badly do you want me?"

"Why Mr. Winchester," she said, "had I know you were so forward the day we met I mightn't have answered your questions at all."

"Was that you, that day?" said Sam. "Did I meet you, or did I meet the girl who had that body before you?"

"I don't think I want to answer that," she said, taking a step forward for every step that Sam took back. "I don't think I want to answer any of your questions at all."

"Oh, you'll answer our questions," said Dean. "No matter what it takes."

"I think that's something that's going to take a lot more than you have to give," she said.

Suddenly she stopped, right as they reached the corner of the outside corridor, and looked up at the ceiling. Just a couple of steps further around that corner would have brought her into the trap Sam had hastily scrawled on the ceiling with a piece of chalk.

"Oh, that's precious," she said. "I want to take that home with me to show the family."

"You're not going anywhere," said Dean, standing blocking her way in one direction while Sam blocked the other.

"Oh, I think I am," she said, and in one smooth motion to the side, completely unanticipated, she crashed the glass window and landed on the terrace outside. Immediately the wind came whistling into the building, scattering bits of glass everywhere and making the sharp fragments still attached to the window frame shake under its force.

She'd left him with no choice. Dean was going out.

Meg hadn't gone far; that body was broken and bleeding, held together by force of ill will alone. One hand on the railing, wind whipping her hair, she looked back at Dean with a twisted smile on her face.

"I've got a secret," she sing-songed at him through cracked lips.

"Yeah, I'll just bet you do," he said. "And that's exactly what we intend to get out of you."

"Oh?" she said, raising seared eyebrows. "You want to know my secret?"

"We want to know all your secrets," said Dean, leaning in close to snarl in her face. "And we will, with a little time and pressure."

"I'll save you the trouble," she said, leaning even closer, close enough to whisper. "Here's my secret, Dean. _You're on the wrong coast._."

"We're what?" he said, wide-eyed, leaning away from her again.

She smiled that same smile again, twisted and cruel, then before Dean could so much as make a grab at her blouse she was leaning back over the railing and tumbling thirty-five stories to the rooftop below.

Dean rushed the railing and stared at her crumpled, unmoving body until he felt his brother's hand on his shoulder.

"What did she say?" he asked, squeezing hard. "Dean, what did she say?"

"She said we have to go," said Dean, finally stumbling back from the railing. "We need to get out of New York, Sam."

"Not that I'm not keen to get out of the city, Dean, but demons lie," said Sam, letting go of him so they could move back towards the safety of the building. "She might just want to get rid of us."

"No," said Dean, shaking his head. "Getting us here to this city, _that_ was messing with us. Dad's nowhere near New York City, Sam, not now, maybe not ever. He's not even on this coast!"

"You don't know that," said Sam.

"No, but you do," said Dean. "God damn it, I should have listened to you, listened to your doubts. Your vision, it never was of this city."

"It was impossible to tell, Dean," said Sam, "we couldn't have-- damn it!"

Sam swore so infrequently that Dean took particular notice when he did. "What, what is it?" he said. "Sam?"

"There was something... in the vision, in the back of my head... if I'd only realized sooner."

"Realized what, Sam?" said Dean, raising his voice over the sound of the wind.

"The building I saw, the reason I thought it looked familiar. It wasn't because I'd seen it on a picture or a postcard, Sam, it's because it's outside of San Francisco. That's where we need to go. That's where we're going to meet Dad."

 _They were on the wrong coast_ , and who knew how much time they'd wasted chasing after Meg, when their real target was going in the other direction all along.

 

_Riverton, Maryland_

Sam understood just how determined Dean was to cross the country when they drove through the night, barely speaking, stopping only to top up the water while they could, lest they run out at any inopportune place. He knew they couldn't keep up this pace once they got further west, but Dean seemed determined to make the best time he could while the roads were still good.

Sam managed to get a little sleep while they were on the road, but the dawn light reflecting off the front-end gauges woke him before long, and he stretched as best he could within the confines of the automobile.

Dean was still silent and grim, and Sam was content to wait and watch the scenery pass by until Dean wanted to break the silence.

"Just tell me you don't think we're going to be too late," said Dean finally, out of the blue. "Tell me this whole mad trip isn't in vain."

"I don't know, Dean," said Sam, "but I have the feeling that Dad isn't there yet. I think he's still on the road, just like us, and Tyr is a great horse, but he doesn't have the stamina Tessa has. And you know dad, there's no way he's leaving him behind."

"Right," said Dean. "Yes, you're right. If he headed west right after Chicago, though, he would long since have arrived in San Francisco."

" _If_ he headed west straightaway," said Sam. "He's following the same signs and omens we are. And I checked, Dean; there were no indications he should go to San Francisco - or anywhere in California - during the time we were heading for New York. None at all. More likely he headed down to Tennessee or Arkansas; I don't know if it's anything, but there were some indications that something was going on down there just this past week."

"Then it's a good thing we're heading through that way," said Dean, eyes on the road and hands clenched so hard around the steering wheel his knuckles were white. "I can't believe they fooled us that way. Drawing us right to the wrong coast!"

"It wasn't a wasted trip, Dean," said Sam, but he too felt the frustration of that detour, and of this entire hunt, beginning to wear down on him. "We learned things in New York that we didn't already know."

"I hate feeling like they're leading us around by the nose, Sammy! They're always a step ahead of us, both them _and_ Dad."

"Well, we've got the advantage of knowing where we're going now," said Sam, "and I'll bet they don't know that. We can prepare, Dean. We'll be ready."

"We'd better be," said Dean, and drove a little faster.

 

_Lawrenceburg, Tennessee_

There was still snow on the road, a light dusting, but it was nothing compared to what they would've encountered if they'd tried to travel any further north. The northern route was the more familiar, the more used, but the southern route, this time of year, was the faster.

"We should stop for the night soon," said Sam, "unless you're heading somewhere particular. You need sleep, Dean."

"Don't you know where we are?" said Dean.

Sam squinted at the landscape, but at sunset with a layer of snow all over it didn't ring any bells.

"No, I guess you wouldn't," said Dean. "He was still up in Blue Earth when you left for school, wasn't he? We're no more than five miles from Pastor Jim's church, Sammy. Hot meals and warm beds for the night. "

After the past few days, Sam had to admit that sounded heavenly, and he didn't care if that meant he'd been spoilt by his years in Palo Alto. There was such a thing as driving yourself so hard you were no good to anyone, and if Dean drove his automobile off the road because he wasn't getting enough rest they would never make it to San Francisco in the first place.

"I haven't seen him in years," said Sam. "He sent me a letter once, though. At school. Just to see how I was getting on."

"Huh," said Dean, his gaze not even flickering towards Sam. Sam had always wondered how Jim Murphy had known where to find him, since Sam certainly hadn't had the opportunity to tell him, but he thought now he knew just how it had happened. "Well, you two were always close."

"When I was a kid," agreed Sam. "He was always there when...."

"Dad wasn't?"

"Dad never understood me," said Sam. "Pastor Jim always did. I wish we hadn't lost touch."

It was his fault, he knew that, but at the time he'd been so determined to cut ties, before he realized what an impossible task that really was. And by the time he did, it was hard to go back.

"I bet Dad would understand you now," said Dean quietly. Sam bet his father would understand him all too well now. He knew he understood his father far better than he ever thought he would.

Pastor Jim's church was the centerpiece of a tiny, nameless village, small enough to look suspiciously upon the arrival of strangers and large enough to notice they'd arrived. They were met at the steps of the church by a man in a black suit, hair disheveled and expression somber.

"What's your business here?"

"Hey," said Dean, raising his hands to protest his innocence. "It's okay, we're old friends of Pastor Jim Murphy. We were passing through and wanted to pay him a visit."

"Old friends, you say?" he said, narrowing his eyes.

"Since we were kids," said Sam, trying to see past him into the church, wondering what this was all about. "We used to stay with him sometimes, up in Blue Earth. I've been away at university."

His expression cleared a little at that, though not entirely. "Well, I'm sorry to be the one to tell you, then," he said, "but his funeral was yesterday."

"The...." Dean began, staring in obvious disbelief. "Pastor Jim is dead? When? How?"

"We don't know what happened," he said. "We found him with his throat cut on the sanctuary floor." Then, finally, he offered his hand. "I'm sorry for the less than warm welcome, but it's been a terrible week here. My name's Jimmy. I served as Jim's secretary, when he required one."

"Jim and Jimmy," said Dean, and almost smiled. Jimmy _did_ smile, though it was a bittersweet one.

"That's what the congregation used to say," he said.

"Well, I'm Dean and this here is Sam. Winchester," he said. "This is just so hard to believe. I knew Jim before I even learned how to read. I can't believe someone would want to hurt him that way."

It was bait, Sam knew that, but at the same time there was a certain sincerity to it. If anyone were to survive the evils of the world, it should've been Jim Murphy.

"I saw the... the body," said Jimmy, lowering his voice. "I know the horrors or mankind are myriad, but the way his blood was drained like that... it's hard to believe it was human."

"Well, like you said, mankind is capable of terrible things," said Sam, and wondered if they'd have the chance to check for traces of sulfur, or if it was already too late. "I'm sorry for your loss. You must have been close."

"He was a true friend and a faithful man of God," said Jimmy sorrowfully. "He'll be missed by all of us."

"He'll be missed by a lot of people," said Dean, and Sam knew he was thinking not only of themselves but of the vast network of hunters across the continent. "I hope whoever or whatever did this will be made to pay."

"God saw what happened here," said Jimmy. "Somehow, in some way, justice will be served."

"Do you mind if we spend some time in the church?" said Sam. "In some way, I believe he's still here."

"Of course," said Jimmy. "Wait, you said your last name was Winchester?"

"We did," said Dean, his attention captured. "Did another Winchester pass through here recently?"

"Not that I'm aware of," he said, "but Jim had me post a letter to a Winchester just the day before he passed. A John Winchester, if I recall correctly."

"Pastor Jim sent Dad a letter?" said Sam. "Do you happen to know what it was about?"

"No, I'm afraid it was a private correspondence," he said. "Signed and sealed before it ever passed into my hands. Jim was adamant it be posted as soon as possible."

"Where?" said Dean urgently. " _Where_ did you post it to? What address?"

"Now that I recall," said Jimmy. "It was care of a saloon in Nebraska, which did at the time strike me as unusual."

"Harvelle's Roadhouse, I presume," said Dean, giving Sam a look that was easy to interpret. It was no mystery where they were headed next.

"The very same," he said. "I take it you're familiar with it?"

"Well, the letter _was_ addressed to our father," said Dean. One thing didn't have to do with the other, but it was as good an explanation as any. "I guess we'd better catch up with him. It sounds like something important."

Sam nodded slowly and swallowed the lump in his throat. "I don't suppose you know of anyplace nearby where we might hire a room for the night?" he said. "We'd counted on staying with Jim."

"I think if the pastor were with us he'd insist you do just that," he said. "His house has been sitting empty since his passing, and if you'd be willing to give the place a little life again, if only for one night, I think the congregation would insist you stay as well."

"That's very kind of you," said Dean. "It'd be... nice to feel close to him, this one last time. Thank you." Sam nodded his agreement and let Dean do the talking. All his thoughts about a reunion with the man who, for a time, had been like a father to him, and this was what it came to. Too late even for the funeral.

The demon was going to pay, no matter what it took.

 

_Memphis, Tennessee_

"What, did everyone decide the other side of the Mississippi looked prettier today?" said Dean, standing up in his stationary vehicle and looking at the mess of wagons and buggies in front of him. "If they'd just let me go I could've beat the train across."

"And if you hadn't, Dean?"

"I could've gotten out of its way, no problem," said Dean. "You haven't even seen my rockets yet."

"I will concede that you drive the finest automobile on the road," said Sam, "and I will caress every inch of her if you ask it of me, but I won't believe there are rockets hidden in her tubes and valves somewhere."

"I wouldn't call them hidden," said Dean, remaining standing as he impatiently watched the train go by. "They're just not perfected yet, that's all."

"What does that mean, exactly, 'not perfected'?" said Sam.

"I haven't quite worked out a steering mechanism yet," he admitted. "Or brakes."

"Dean?"

"Yes, Sam?"

"Don't use the rockets."

"I wouldn't have to if they'd let us on the bridge," said Dean. "There's plenty of room for me to drive alongside the train. I've been in tighter situations."

"I seem to remember being in a tighter situation _with_ you," said Sam. It felt like a hundred years ago though, the locomotive race at Jericho Station. Jessica had still been alive. Sam had still been a university student.

It was at Jericho Station that he'd first met Meg.

"So what do you say, do you think they could stop us if we tried?"

"I think they'd stop us at the other side," said Sam, "and you wouldn't have to worry about your lack of a braking system. You might give the papers something to write about though."

Dean tapped his fingers against the top of Tessa's windshield and glared at the slow-moving train. Or what Sam was sure he considered a slow-moving train; all things considered, Sam thought it was going at a respectable speed.

"Just a few more minutes," said Sam, but the words seemed to do more to incite Dean than soothe him. "Just think about how far it would be to drive north to the next bridge, and waiting out the train won't seem so bad."

"Next time I have time to tinker with her, I'm adding a paddling system strong enough to handle the Mississippi."

"Tessa is an amazing automobile, Dean, but she can't be all things," said Sam. "Look, you can see the end of it now."

"I'm going to run down these buggies," said Dean, finally sitting back down again. He'd left Tessa running; all he needed to do was let the throttle out and they were on their way. Which, as soon as the train had passed and traffic had been signaled, he did, shooting out past half the people in front of him and onto the bridge.

"Don't actually kill anyone," said Sam dryly. "We can't afford the delay."

"Don't I know it," said Sam, but he didn't actually relax until they were safe on the other side and on their way again.

 

_Sloan, Arkansas_

The language Dean used when they blew out a tire just outside the border of Oklahoma Territory was startling even for Sam, who'd spend most of his life with his brother and father.

"C'mon baby," he said when he was done with his tantrum, stroking her glossy paint. "You wouldn't do this to me here, would you? It's three miles to the nearest town, and God only knows how long to get a replacement tire here."

"I don't think sweet talking her is going to work this time," said Sam regretfully, already putting his things together for the walk back the way they'd just come. "We might as well get going while there's still light."

"Oh no," said Dean. "I'm not leaving my baby here unattended."

"Then what would you suggest we do?" said Sam. "Wait and hope that the next rainstorm brings spare tires falling from the sky?"

"As convenient as that would be," said Dean, "no. I'll stay with her and you head back into town."

"To do what?" said Sam. "I haven't the first clue what you'll need to fix Tessa."

"All right," said Dean, stroking his automobile again. "You stay with her and I'll go back into town. If I'm lucky they'll have a spare in Little Rock. If I have to go any further afield, we could be here for _days_ , Sammy. We don't have time to be here for days."

Sam wasn't particularly pleased to be left on his own in the wilderness, but he had a veritable arsenal at his disposal so it wasn't as though he was going to be helpless and alone. Dean would actually be the more vulnerable.

"Wear your warm boots," he said instead of explicitly agreeing. "If you catch cold we'll be delayed even longer."

"I don't need to be told to wear my warm boots," said Dean, but nonetheless he grumbled as he changed into them, and packed up what things he'd need for the walk. "I'll be back tonight no matter what, Sammy."

"Dean, don't be foolhardy. If it's dark, just pass the night in town."

"No, I'll be back tonight," he insisted. "Take care of her, Sammy. And yourself."

"It's nice to know which you put first," said Sam, but he gave Dean a smile and a wave as Dean headed off down the dirt road and then settled in for a long wait. At least he still had daylight, and his father's journal to thumb through while he had this time to himself.

Sam had started keeping a journal of his own back in Nebraska, after Jess, after he realized that this was his life again and it was possible it always would be. So far, though, it was filled only with notes about demons: how to find them, trap them and banish them. That, and a handful of pictures from the road, of Dean and Bobby and Pamela and Tessa and those few other things that caught his eye. Maybe, for him, that was what his journal really needed to be - a record of his entire life, and not just one piece of it.

He read the first pages of his father's journal for what had to be the tenth time, because those first pages of the journal somehow had more of his father and less of the hunter in them. It was his father as Sam didn't remember him, aching, confused, vulnerable, angry at the world and terrified of it at the same time. Terrified for his sons. Desperate to avenge his wife.

Now, after Jess, Sam finally understood a lot of what his father went through back then, and Sam didn't have two small children to somehow care for on top of everything else. He might not understand all the choices his father made, but he understood why he made them now.

It was long after dark when Dean returned, stubborn bastard that he was, trekking along the open road with only a single, hand-held lantern to light his way.

"Told you I'd be back," he said, the smile on his face looking strained as he sat down at the fire Sam'd built up.

"So what's the news?" said Sam, just to get it out there. Good or bad, he just wanted to know.

"Next train from St. Louis," said Dean, kicking up some dirt with his boots. "Day after tomorrow."

"I'll bet you had some choice words to say about _that_ ," said Sam as he watched Dean warm his fingers and toes.

"Almost got myself kicked out of the telegraph office," said Dean, chuckling humorlessly. "Probably for the best that I had a three-mile walk in the cold to cool off."

"Should've stayed in town," Sam muttered, but it wasn't as though it was a surprise that Dean had stuck by his declaration and returned to Sam and Tessa in the dark. "A day and a half might not make any difference at all."

"Or it might make all the difference," said Dean. "Not that it matters the slightest bit now, since we have no choice in the matter. Tessa's not going anywhere without a new tire, which means neither are we. Tomorrow's going to be a long day."

: : :

Dean was still snoring by the dying fire when Sam woke shortly after dawn, face down in his cocoon of blankets with his latest dime novel half buried under his arm. Sam made the coffee, strong and black, and picked up the newspaper that Dean had brought back with him from town.

It was another hour before Dean woke, time for Sam to make breakfast and read the paper from cover to cover. Fortunately in that order, because after reading the paper he didn't much feel like eating.

"Sammy?" he mumbled.

"Right here," said Sam, checking to make sure there was still coffee. "Do you have any plans for today?"

Dean had barely blinked his eyes open yet, so the look he turned upon Sam was fairly confused. He didn't even try to answer until the entirety of the question finally sank in.

"I thought I'd do some tinkering," he said. "Tune up Tessa. Clean the weapons."

"We haven't used anything since New York."

"And we were in enough of a hurry to get out of the city that I wasn't very thorough," said Dean, finally sitting up and stretching his upper body, shivering in an undershirt that was thinning and yellowing with age.

"You could do that," agreed Sam, picking up the paper and folding it in half to hand it over. "Or we could do this."

"What's this?" said Dean, taking the paper and shaking it open. "What am I looking at, Sammy? I stole this from the telegraph office. I haven't read it yet."

"Obviously," said Sam, then just sat and waited. It was on the front page, after all. It wasn't going to take long.

"People are being eaten," said Dean.

"Well, people are being mostly eaten, anyway," said Sam. "They found some pieces."

"Plenty of wild animals who'd be happy to eat a piece of you if they're hungry," said Dean. "Sounds like the local wildlife got a taste for people."

"Keep reading," said Sam.

He knew when Dean got to the important part by the sharp intake of breath. "They found human bite marks," he said.

"On the flesh and on the bones," said Sam. "I can only imagine the extraordinary restraint that must have taken to not use that as the headline."

"So what are you thinking?" said Dean. "Wendigo?"

"That would be my first guess," said Sam. "And my second. I know we're short on transportation right now, but if you'd be willing to leave your precious Tessa for a little while, one of the bodies was found near here, right by the border."

"Bodies?"

"Okay, a hunter found a leg," said Sam. "But it was pretty fresh."

Dean was clearly torn between wanting to stay with his most precious possession and wanting to fill this day with a hunt to feel less like they were cooling their heels while their goal got further and further away from them.

"No more than a couple of miles," said Sam. "Tessa's got as many protective symbols on her as you know."

"It's not the supernatural I'm worried about," said Dean, giving his automobile a longing gaze. "But what would Dad think of us if we didn't even check it out? I'll get the crossbow and the flare gun."

"Just the flare gun and the pistols, Dean," said Sam. "I'm not carrying the crossbow two miles when we don't even know if we're going to encounter anything, and especially when the flare guns will do the job just as well."

"You used to like the crossbow," said Dean, "especially when we set the bolts on fire." But he didn't argue the point and when he crossed to Tessa to dress and gear up, he returned with only the smaller weapons. "All right, douse the fire, Sammy. If we're going to do this, we might as well do this."

Sam poured Dean a tin cup of coffee and handed it over before cleaning up their campsite, stowing everything in the cargo compartment of Tessa and letting Dean seal her up and lock her down.

"If there's so much as a scratch on her when we get back--"

"You've left her alone in far more vulnerable places before," Sam reminded him. "She hardly looks abandoned. I don't think anybody will make that mistake."

The border between Arkansas and Oklahoma Territory wasn't clearly marked, there wasn't a signpost or a fence to mark the spot, but when you got too far on one side or the other, you'd eventually know it. They were off the road, but there were trails through the woods and narrow paths through the open fields, and not much to get in the way of their steady march towards the area where a man had been devoured within the past couple of days.

"Do you hear that?" said Dean, peering through the edge of the trees along the path. Just when they thought they were on to something, too. Sam didn't hear anything, but he did see a thin cloud of dust to indicate something was approaching.

"Whatever that is, it's not a Wendigo," he said.

"Not unless Wendigo suddenly ride motorcycles," said Dean as the dust cloud moved closer. "She's beautiful."

Sam assumed he meant the motorbike, long and gleaming with pipes and valves running up the sides and just a faint trickle of steam from the back. He knew they sat at least partly atop a boiler in Tessa, but he wasn't certain he could imagine riding astride one without some serious concern.

The man wore heavy trousers and a cotton shirt with a beaded leather coat overtop, his hair plucked but for a single scalp-lock. He stopped the motorcycle at the base of the gentle hill that Sam and Dean were atop, and was clearly waiting for them. It was not difficult to guess that either they'd strayed onto Cherokee territory, or they were about to.

"Hello," said Dean, waving a hand in greeting. "Our automobile broke down on the road. about two miles back that way."

"Do you need any help?"

Dean shook his head. "Wasn't something I could fix myself so we're waiting on a part now. We thought we'd stretch our legs for a while."

"You'll want to be careful in these woods," he said, nodding at the trees behind them. "Even in daylight. There have been some incidents."

"We saw that in the newspaper," said Dean, and even made a brief motion to show him before remembering they'd left it back in Tessa. "You'll probably want to be careful too. Something that can devour a person like that is not something anyone would want to encounter."

"And yet you're here," he noted.

While it would have been impolitic to note that they had come armed and prepared for anything, Sam didn't doubt that he already knew that. They certainly were making no attempt to hide the pistols, at the very least.

"We can take care of ourselves," insisted Dean.

"You think you can take care of this problem so that no one else will get hurt," he said, seeing right through Dean's bluster, sincere though it was. "You should go back to your automobile."

"And ignore the fact that people are being hurt?" said Dean. "That's just not the sort of men that me and my brother are."

"I can see that you believe that," he said, fingers tight on the handlebars of his motorcycle and looking at them with a steely gaze, "but you don't know what you're getting into."

"Don't we?" said Dean, meeting that gaze without flinching. "Will you think I'm crazy if I tell you I think there's a Wendigo somewhere in these woods?"

He shook his head, and looked back over his shoulder to where there were now three more men approaching on horseback. Then he looked hard and long at each of the Winchester boys in turn.

"It's not Wendigo," he said finally, "it's Nun'yunu'wi. And not your concern."

"If it's killing people and eating them then I think it _is_ our concern," said Dean. "We've dealt with this kind of thing before."

"Oh, you know how to defeat Nun'yunu'wi, do you?" he said. "You think you know better than we do?" Dean looked back at Sam, but Sam wasn't able to offer anything he didn't already have. "Go about your business, Hunter. We have this one in hand."

Dean knew when to push ahead, but he also knew when to back down, and he didn't need any subtle hints from Sam to do it.

"Good luck then," he said, instead of making any argument, respect for a fellow hunter - in spirit if not in name - in his voice. "I hope you get it."

He nodded his acknowledgment and looked back down the path. "Do you want an escort for your return?"

"Thanks, but we know the way," said Dean, then pointed it out with one arm. "Two miles back that way, if you need us."

"Thank you," he said, with a respect equaling that Dean had given him, "but we've been preparing for this. It should be over tonight."

Dean gave him another wave, which Sam echoed this time, before buttoning his coat and heading back up the hill on the path they'd come from, heading back to camp once again.

: : :

"So is there any mention of Nun'yunu'wi in Dad's journal?" said Dean as he built up the fire again. It would be getting dark soon; the air was already starting to feel a little chillier and they had another night to spend outdoors. Maybe Dean would actually bother to get the tent out this time.

"Yes, actually," said Sam, frowning as he read the entry. "Not much; he only heard of it by legend and not experience. It's also known as the Stone Man and... wow, he wasn't wrong that we weren't equipped to deal with this one, Dean."

"What do you mean, not equipped?" said Dean. "Okay, maybe flare guns wouldn't have gotten the job done, but--" He stopped as Sam thrust the journal in front of him to read the entry himself. It didn't take long. "Okay," he said, swallowing hard. "Maybe we could've found another way, but not that one."

Where would they even _find_... well, Dean wasn't going to dwell on how one asked that question, in polite _or_ impolite company.

"So what do you think?" he said as he passed the diary back again. "Beans and rice for dinner?"

"As long as you're making it," said Sam. "I made breakfast."

"I didn't even eat breakfast."

"That's not my fault," said Sam. "I also made the coffee."

"You did make the coffee," Dean was forced to concede. Not that he hadn't been planning to make supper for both of them in the first place, but sometimes a token argument was just called for.

"What time does the train get in?" Sam asked him, closing and wrapping the leather-bound book again and stashing it away inside the vehicle.

"Eight a.m. on the nose, or so I'm informed," said Dean. "Apparently the train is never late."

"Never believe anyone who says a train is never late," said Sam. "All that means is they've never really had to rely on one."

"Ain't that the truth," agreed Dean, "but whether it's eight or quarter past, I'll still head back into town as soon as I'm up."

He did set up the tent after they finished eating, but only as an alternative if the temperature dipped down beyond what they could bear. The night was clear, the moon not full but bright, and the temperature was mercifully hovering somewhere above freezing. They'd certainly spent the night out in worse.

"Do you want to sleep in shifts tonight?" Sam suggested after seating himself next to the fire and accepting the bowl of just-barely-warmed food that Dean passed over.

"I'm not going to sleep well out here knowing that thing might be on the loose," said Dean, staring into the fire as the sky got darker and darker. "I'm not keen on being eaten by something I can't shoot. I'll take first watch." For all the good it would do them, since apparently they were ill-equipped to tangle with it.

"I'll be up for a while anyway," said Sam with his mouth full, scarfing down everything Dean gave him. "Feeling a little restless."

"Yeah, I want to get on the road again too," said Dean. "Like an itch."

"You've never stopped, have you?" said Sam. "You've never stopped moving, not really."

"I wouldn't know what to do with myself if I did," said Dean. And it wasn't that he'd never had dreams of a home, of a place to call their own, but he was old enough to know that it could never have lived up to what he built it up as in his mind.

"But when it's all over, what are you going to do?"

"You say that like it'll ever be over," said Dean. "How can it be over? It's over when my life is over."

"You know what I mean, Dean. When the demon is gone, what are you going to do? Because we are going to get him. We are. And then what happens? Do you go back on the road?"

"Sam," he said, the clenching around his heart making even his words come out tight. "It's all I know."

"It doesn't have to be," said Sam. "You could stay with me."

"Or you could stay with me this time," said Dean. "What do you want to go back for, huh? What's there for you anymore, Sammy?"

"I don't mean Stanford," said Sam. "It doesn't have to be Stanford. It could be anywhere, Dean."

Dean swallowed and looked down at his own dinner. "Sure would make it easier to look out for you," he said finally. "You didn't make that easy this last while. Before... you know."

"Things got complicated," said Sam. As if 'complicated' could even begin to express how messed up things in their family had become. "Dad had his crusade and you had... I'm still not sure I understand what you had."

Like the choice to separate had been Dean's, and not Sam's.

"I know you were too young to remember that first year, Sammy, but I do," said Dean after a long silence, looking up at the stars. "That first year we didn't do much but ride the rails with Dad. Boy did he get hell from some of the boys for having us with him. Saloon after saloon and church after church until he found someone who could give him what he was looking for."

"Sometimes I wish they never had."

"Yeah, well sometimes I do too," said Dean. Sometimes he wished this whole mess had never fallen on them, but they hadn't had much choice in the matter. "I know you and Dad have your differences, but he tried, Sammy. He tried. And so did I."

Sam shook his head, but it wasn't disagreement. Dean knew the difference between disagreement and frustration, even now. "You raised me more than he did, Dean, and we all know it."

"Because he needed me to, Sam. He knew what you needed, and it was me," said Dean. "We'd be on a freight train in the middle of Tennessee and 'Hold onto Sammy' he'd say. 'Hold on tight.' And I never let you go, Sam. I _never_ let you go, even when I could hardly get my arms around you anymore. I never let you go until you went away and made me."

"Dean...."

"You made me do it, Sam, and it just about killed me," said Dean. "So you want to know what I'm going to do when we get this demon? I don't care, as long as you don't make me let you go again."

"Dean...."

"Yeah, you said that already," said Dean, pinching back any sign of tears. He was not going to cry, not even when it was just his brother and him in the dark. "But hunting is what I do, Sam. There are always going to be things out there that need hunting."

"We'll figure something out," said Sam. "I don't want to go back to life without you either."

"Good," said Dean, and ate a mouthful of cold beans, and even though he knew that wasn't all there was to be said, for now it was enough.

At first light Dean went back into town to pick up his shipment from the train, and by noon they were on their way again, traveling the marked road through Oklahoma Territory and onward, heading west.

 

_Hunter, Kansas_

Every time Sam saw the burned out shell of a house now he wondered if it had once been home to someone like him, someone who'd been _changed_ when he was a baby, someone who'd lost a mother so early he couldn't even remember her. He especially thought of it as they passed through Kansas, neatly heading west and sometimes avoiding even looking in the direction of Lawrence.

They'd faced that demon, so to speak, but those scars ran too deep to be healed by a single visit.

"It's just a house fire, Sam," he heard Dean say following about an hour of silence, and Sam gazed out on some charred timbers, all that remained of what had once been a farmhouse, land gone wild around it, a tree sprouted right from what had once been a kitchen, a parlor, a bedroom. "It was a long time ago."

"So was ours," said Sam, and made it a point to stop in the next town for some much needed food and drink. Dean didn't argue, but he didn't linger either.

At the next table two girlfriends were sharing tea and cake, and when Alice told Mary that she felt like her suitor could _read her mind_ , Sam wondered just how many more people there were out there who were just like him.

 

_Alma, Nebraska_

"Dean!" said Ellen when Dean pushed the doors open wide in front of himself and sat down at the not-yet-open bar.

"Just tell me Dad's come through. Please," said Dean. "God, at this point just lie to me if you have to."

"A few days ago," said Ellen. "Racing through like he had the devil himself on his heels, just like the two of you. I couldn't even get him to stay the night."

"Something big is going down," said Dean. "He's trying to get out to the west coast, and so are we."

"I know," said Ellen, "and he's going to beat you there. You want to tell me what's going on? Anything I should be worried about?"

"The devil's not on his heels, it's ahead of us, and we're running to catch up," said Dean. "I don't know who else should be worried. Maybe everyone. Maybe no one. Ellen, did you have a letter for him? From Jim Murphy?"

"How did you know that?" she said. "You been talking to Jim? How is he?"

"Did you _read_ the letter?"

"No more than I read your father's journal when he left it for you," she said. "It wasn't my business and I wasn't going to make it my business."

"Good," he said, "though I'm not sure it's going to matter. Pastor Jim's dead, Ellen, and we think it was a demon that did it. Maybe the one we're hunting, maybe not. The last thing he did was send Dad that letter."

"Well, I don't know what to tell you, Dean," she said. "All I can say is that your father got the letter safe and sound, and whatever was in it he didn't share it with anyone here. Now if you think something's going to be coming after us here, Dean Winchester, you'd better tell me now."

"No, I don't think it is," said Dean. He couldn't be sure, but then who could? The Roadhouse, just by virtue of its existence, was a risky venture. "You don't have anything it wants."

"And what does it want, exactly? You can't just come in here and tell me Jim Murphy's dead and expect me not to be a little bit concerned, Winchester."

It wanted Sam, but Dean wasn't going to say that in a saloon full of hunters without being able to talk about why, or being able to assure them that their presence alone wasn't dangerous.

"I think Jim knew something that the demon didn't want anyone else to know," said Dean. "If nobody read it, then nobody here knows. Did Dad say anything when he came through? Anything at all?

"Nothing much, but he left someone behind in the stables."

There was only one thing that could have meant, but that was impossible.

"He left Tyr here?" said Dean incredulously. "Are you kidding me? That horse is like an extension of himself."

"Couldn't fly with him," said Ellen. "Your daddy hooked up with an aeronaut out of Cheyenne who took him over the mountains. Said if he didn't come back, to make sure Tyr got to you boys."

"That son of a bitch."

"I told him you'd been here."

"Of course you did," muttered Dean. Not that their father wasn't well aware by this point that he was fighting a losing battle against his sons. Dean wished he would just quit running and let them do this as a family, the way it should have been all along. "Joe around?"

"Out back," said Ellen, frowning at him like she could hear the 'e' on the name. "She's been talking about you."

"I'll take that as a compliment," said Dean, even though he wasn't sure it was meant as one. He wasn't sure what it meant at all. "I'm going to go see the horse, if you'll excuse me."

"I'll hope you're talking about Tyr and not my daughter," said Ellen, and Dean even managed to smile as he slipped out of the saloon. A tight smile, but a smile nonetheless.

Sure enough, he'd know that horse anywhere. Tyr recognized him as well, nuzzling Dean's hand when he reached over the wooden gate of the stall.

"Yeah, I don't understand it any better than you do, boy," he said, looking around for a treat for him. He'd have to see if Ellen kept any carrots or apples around. "We're always one step behind him, and he's in a hell of a hurry."

Tyr whinnied and Dean just patted his head some more. "I know you're fast, but I guess taking to the air is faster when there are mountains involved. But he'll be back. I promise you, he'll be back."

It was a promise he had no right to make but he did it anyway. Something big was in front of them, bigger than Chicago, bigger than New York, and he couldn't promise that any of them would walk away from it, let alone all of them.

"Dean?"

He looked over his shoulder to see Sam poking his head into the stable. "Ellen told me you were out here. Is that--?"

"Dad found alternative transportation," said Dean. As if he could understand what was being said, Tyr hung his head, letting Dean get his hand in right behind his ears. "Not your fault," Dean assured him. "You're still his best friend."

"Dad was here?"

"Dad was here," confirmed Dean, "and we're still chasing him after all these months. But we're getting closer. Ellen says he came through a few days ago."

"And left Tyr behind," said Sam, coming up behind him. "Do you think he remembers me?"

"Much like so many people I've been fortunate enough to deal with over the years," said Dean, "he'll be more likely to remember you if you offer him a treat."

"Fair enough," said Sam, grabbing an apple from the basket at the front of the stables and offering it to Tyr. But the horse didn't seem to need the bribe, taking to Sam on sight. "I guess he does remember me."

"Well, you always were pretty unforgettable," said Dean. No matter what Sam thought he and his father had done over the years before they were reunited. "We shouldn't stay. If we get back on the road, we can make some more miles before dark."

"Enough miles to make it worth missing out on the last real bed we'll see for days, and what information the Roadhouse can provide before we start the last leg?" said Sam, scratching behind Tyr's ears. "I can't believe he left him behind. I don't remember him ever leaving him behind before."

"Well this is it, Sam," said Dean. "This is the end of the road. This is what makes all those years leading up to it worthwhile. We want to be there."

"We want to be there and _win_ ," said Sam. "Dean, we can still leave at first light. Unless Ellen told you we aren't welcome."

"No," said Dean, and was still fairly sure they'd be able to claim a room for the night. "She did tell me Dad got his letter, though. I don't know if it really did have something to do with Pastor Jim's death or not, but if it did then at least the effort wasn't in vain."

"First light," said Sam, "and there'll be no stopping us from here to San Francisco. I won't even shriek like a girl when you decide to race through the rail tunnel again."

"Don't make promises you can't keep, Sammy," said Dean. "We already lost some time with the blow-out and I just need to _be_ there."

"You think I want to be there any less than you do, Dean?" he said. "It killed _Jess_. It killed Mom. It's not killing anyone else I love."

"We get there in time, right?" said Dean. "In your vision we're _there_ right? It's not just Dad?"

"The visions aren't necessarily a completely accurate representation of the future, Dean," said Sam. But they were close. They were close enough. "Yes, we were all there."

"Then that's good enough for me," said Dean. He pet Tyr one more time, then pet Sam's shoulder, then turned for the door for of the stables. "There's someone else I need to say hello to. I'll see you inside, Sam.

: : :

Jo had her sleeves rolled up to her elbows, shirt loose and untucked under her suspenders, and a cowboy hat tipped forward blocking the sunshine

"Joe?" said Dean, hands in his pockets as he approached.

She looked up and wiped the back of her hand across her forehead. If Dean didn't know better, he would've thought she was the boy she wanted most people to believe she was.

"Dean Winchester," she said. "Well, I figured you'd be through again sooner or later. It's about time."

"About time," he scoffed. "We've been riding hard since New York, about time. How've you been, Joe?"

"Bout the same," she said. "You look like hell."

"Thanks, I needed to hear that," he said. He hadn't looked in a mirror in a couple of days, but he knew he had to look rough, stubble and grime and dust on top of all of it. "I'll clean up before dinner."

"That's not what I meant," she said, but Dean already knew that too. "What happened to you?"

"Too much to tell," said Dean, suddenly feeling the weight of it all on his shoulders. "Too much to think about it. It's been a long few months."

"I'll say," she said, wiping her hands off on her trousers and then wiping a smudge off his cheek with her thumb. He could see the streak of dirt on it when she reached up to take her hat off. She'd kept her hair short, and Dean could imagine Ellen still wasn't too thrilled with that.

"You're spending the night," she said, her face hard as she shook her head at him.

"Last person I need to be mothered by is you, Joe Harvelle," he said, then raised an eyebrow at her. "Unless that was meant to be a proposition."

"Take a bath," she said, looking him up and down shamelessly. "Then you might find someone willing to proposition you. Right now I've got half a mind to ask you to sleep in the stables."

"Might do that anyway," he said. "It's the closest to my father I've been in months."

She nodded and her grip on her hat tightened enough that it crumpled a little under her fingers. "He was sure in a hurry when he came through here."

"Did he say anything, Joe? Anything at all?"

"Sure he said some things," she said. "He had a drink, paid up to board his horse here, asked around after air transport. He had weather reports from here clear through to San Francisco. Must've been planning that trip for a while."

"No," said Dean, shaking his head. "No, he wasn't." Not like Jo was thinking, anyway. "He was looking for something else."

Jo wasn't stupid. She'd been a hunter herself for what was probably years. "If he found omens, he wasn't talking about them," she said. But Dean didn't need to ask. If John left his horse behind and took to the air over the mountains, Dean already knew damn well what he found.

"I should do something about that bath," he said after an awkward silence, no one knowing the right words to say, "if I want anything to eat."

"I'll show you the way," said Jo, and even though he didn't need it, Dean let her.

 

_Terrace, Utah_

Harvelle's was the last real break they got, just like they'd known it would be. Dean was running them hard and still spent each night frustrated by their lack of progress, but the roads were fewer here, the terrain harder, and they were fast approaching a range of mountains they couldn't skirt around but had to face head on once again.

There was only a scrap of daylight left when they stopped, and Sam thought they would've gone longer if something hadn't been rattling in back that Dean needed to stop and take care of. The headlamps had gotten them through a lot of terrain that Sam was very sure they'd never been designed to go, but Dean just pushed forward.

"Sleep while you can," Dean muttered as he got out a lantern and some tools and opened her up.

"I might be able to help," offered Sam, but Dean barely even seemed to be listening to him.

"Hold this, then," was all he said, shoving the lantern in Sam's direction. A few months ago Sam would've complained about being told what to do like that; now he was just grateful. "But you'll only get a few hours before dawn."

"I'll get as much as you will," said Sam. It wasn't much, but it was enough to keep them going. "Can you see what the problem is?"

Dean grunted and didn't offer an answer, so Sam just held the lantern wherever Dean needed it, and watched as he tuned up just about everything that was within sight and reach, including a few things that Sam didn't think could possibly need it. But then, having been through the mountains once already, it was probably best to be more than ready for it, than to break down at the edge of some monumental cliff.

"What are we really chasing after, Dean?" he asked quietly, once, long past dark when his arm was getting so tired it was starting to shake. Their father, the demon, a lost life?

Dean didn't answer, but then Sam didn't really want him to.

The sky was barely beginning to lighten when they started on their way, after a short and fitful sleep, and Sam didn't ask again.

 

_San Francisco, California_

There was a kind of frustration that came from months of chasing after someone without ever quite connecting, from tearing across an entire nation _knowing_ that however fast you went, it wasn't fast enough, from teetering right on the precipice of actually understanding what was going on without ever quite getting it, that couldn't be described. But it could be enacted, and Dean did just that when they finally arrived in San Francisco, parking by an alley and putting his fist into the first fence they came across.

"Did that help?"

"Little bit," said Dean, pulling his hand back and shaking off the pain. His knuckles would be bruised, maybe a little bloodied, but at least that meant he'd have some physical focus for his frustration. "So we're here, Sammy. We made it. Now what?"

"Now we find a place to stay while we figure out what the next move is," said Sam. He was sure Dean was looking for something more like a vision to tell them where to be and what to do, but Sam didn't have one to offer. "If we can. Do you know what today is?"

"The same as every other day for the past couple of weeks?" said Dean. "I don't know, Sam, tell me what today is."

"It's Easter Sunday," he said. "For another couple of hours, anyway." Dean pulled out his pocket watch with his good hand, and Sam gave him a moment to see the date and time for himself. They'd been so focused on their goal that the days and weeks had all piled on top of one another without them ever really stopping to count, the seasons more meaningful than any days and numbers.

And now, suddenly, months had passed and they were all but back where they started.

"Easter Sunday," repeated Dean, shaking his head. Another day that should have been significant in their lives, and another day that had almost passed them right by. "A day for resurrection. And eggs. I think I know which one we're more likely to find."

"Is that some kind of cryptic way of suggesting we find something to eat?" said Sam. "We're unlikely to find anywhere that's serving food this late and on this day."

"Maybe I was talking about resurrection," muttered Dean, shaking his hand one more time before starting back for the automobile. "Whichever it is, we're not going to find it here. This is your town, Sam, you tell me where we try to find a room."

They didn't have time to so much as open the doors, though, before a noise from further up the alley caught their attention. Just a stray, probably, or a rat, but they were both too high-strung at the moment not to give it their full attention.

It was neither.

"Boys," said John Winchester, stepping out from the shadows, shotgun over his shoulder, bloody shirt, and a face that hadn't seen a razor in weeks. "It's good to see you again."

Dean was moving forward before it even really registered with Sam that his father was really there, in the flesh, standing at the mouth of the alley with only moonlight and a single streetlamp illuminating him. He'd wondered sometimes if he'd inflated his father in his mind, if time and distance had conspired to make him larger than life. But John Winchester in person was not diminished from the man Sam remembered.

"Dad," said Dean, stopping just short of throwing his arms around the man when he reached him. "Dad, it's really you."

"I hear you've been looking for me."

"You hear we've been looking for you?" Sam blurted out. "You _hear_ we've been looking for you?"

John looked from one boy to the other, then curled his hand around Dean's shoulder, squeezing hard. "I know I haven't made it easy on you," he said, "but I had my reasons."

"Yeah, well they were crap reasons," said Dean, his voice raw, and tipped his head forward as his father held him the only way he'd ever really learned how.

"Sam," said John after a few moments, finally letting Dean go. "It's been a long time."

"Yes, sir," said Sam, his shoulders stiff and tense as his father approached. Dean hung back and lifted his head just enough to watch the both of them warily. "A long time."

"Sam... you've done good for yourself, son," he said, the words sounding like they had a hard time coming. "I'm sorry about your--"

"Don't," said Sam, his voice feeling as raw as Dean's had sounded. "Please don't. Not _now_ "

He didn't. He just held Sam's shoulder like he'd held Dean's, and he held on tight. And whether he thought Sam's loss was less or more or the same as his own, Sam didn't want to know.

"So where do we find these sons of bitches and how do we get rid of them?" said Dean, finally breaking the silence.

"Don't worry," said John. "I have a few tricks up my sleeve yet."

"I think we've seen enough of your tricks," said Sam, surprised to find his hands were trembling, but whether it was from relief or anger or some kind of complicated mix of the two he wasn't sure. "Is this a trick that's going to involve you vanishing again in the morning?"

"You boys caught me fair and square," he said, though the way it looked to Sam, his father'd caught them. And he hated that it made him suspicious, but he couldn't help it, not after everything they'd been through. "Bobby gave me a talking-to a few weeks back."

"So you were in Chicago," said Dean, his voice a lot more expressionless than Sam would have expected.

John nodded, looking away for a moment. "I know you boys don't understand why--"

"Why you decided to leave us out of the most important hunt of our lives? Leave us out of the thing that we've spent our entire lives working up to?" said Sam. He could see it in his father's eyes, the moment he wanted to remind Sam that he was the one who'd left first, but the words didn't come.

"I wanted to protect you," he said. "I thought I was. But it was made pretty clear to me that the only person I was protecting was myself."

'Why break a lifetime of habit?' Sam wanted to say, but he knew it was unfair. Whatever faults his father had, not wanting to protect his sons wasn't one of them. He'd just always had a hard time figuring out how to do that.

"Bobby has a way of making the truth plain," said Dean. "So does that mean you're staying? You're not going to try to do this without us?"

"I also had it pointed out to me that if I did this without you, I was taking away something I couldn't ever give back."

"Could've told us that a few weeks back and saved us a lot of damn trouble," said Dean. "Do you even know what we've been through, Dad?"

"It took a while for his words to sink in," admitted John. "How about we go back to the room I got a few days back and you tell me all about what I missed."

It was going to take more than a few days to catch John up with everything he'd missed in _Sam's_ life, but at least this was a start.

He hoped.

: : :

Things were pretty quiet until morning, other than the occasional grunt for food or coffee or, in John's case, cigarettes. There was too much to be said, but nobody knew where to start now. Dean was sure Sam had some ideas, but he seemed to be sitting on them now in favor of dinner and sleep.

The two of them curled up together on the bed like they had when they were kids, while their father took a thin blanket and the floor, and when morning came - not the crack of dawn this time, because they had nowhere to be - Dean changed and cleaned and shaved and started to feel more like a human being again.

"I'm going to assume that Bobby talked to you boys about the demon," said John, running a hand over his beard in Dean's shaving mirror but leaving it be.

"He did," said Sam, "even though that's a conversation we should've had with you."

He had his camera in his hands, fussing with it, and Dean wondered if he'd snapped a shot of John to go with all of his others. Just in case.

"What's done is done," said John. "This one's different from the others. The bastard has yellow eyes, yellow like he's poisoned."

Dean remembered the description Ava had given them back in New York and nodded slowly. "Yeah, we heard something like that," he said, "but we weren't sure what it meant."

"I've been trying to find that out," said John. "Maybe with you boys here it'll go a little faster. I followed the omens here to San Francisco, but for two weeks now it's been dead quiet. Not just here, but all over."

"I don't like the sound of that," said Dean, the same time as Sam said, "No, he's here," in a flat, firm tone.

"Well, we'll find him if he is," said John after giving his son a long, slow look that Dean didn't much like.

"So that's what you've been doing for the past two weeks?" said Dean. "Holed up in here trying to smoke this bastard out?"

"Did a job out at the docks," said John. "A mogui came over on one of the boats, nasty fellow. But California's not hurting for hunters and I know what my job here is."

"Our job," said Sam. "This is about all of us."

"Well, I'm glad you've finally come to that decision," said John, tossing him a book. That, at least, was something Sam had always done. "See what you can find in there."

"Yes, sir," said Sam, but for all their hasty reconciliation, Dean could see Sam chafing under the order. He'd barely take it from Dean; taking it from Dad again was going to be a hard sell.

John hesitated a few moments, obviously trying to read him, then added a mumbled, "Thank you," that seemed to get him a lot further than the order had. "You boys are looking good."

"Better than last night, anyway," said Dean as Sam opened the cover of the book. "It's been a rough time."

"It's a rough job," said John, "and you've traveled a long way."

"Where'd you go after Chicago?" Sam demanded without looking up from the book. "As apparently you were there."

"After you were," said John, but the words didn't seem to mean much. "Here and there. Florida, Louisiana. Spent a couple weeks in Texas but that was just a wild goose chase. Then north, up to Nebraska. I hear you found Harvelle's."

"And one day I'm going to ask you what you did to Ellen Harvelle," said Dean, but from the look on his father's face when he mentioned it, now wasn't going to be that time.

"That Joe's sure growing up to be a fine hunter, just like his daddy," John said instead, pulling another book from a repurposed saddlebag he had with him.

Dean looked at Sam, then back at his father again. "You do know that Joe's... I mean, that she's...."

"A she?" said John, and finally gave him an all-too-rare grin. "Wasn't sure _you_ boys knew that."

"Oh, Dean knows," said Sam. "Dean sure knows."

If John was curious about that, he didn't give it away. "I cut her hair," Dean said anyway. "She asked."

"That was you?" said John. "Well, I'll be. Did a good job of it, she sure seemed happy. Ellen less so. But then, Ellen never was too happy with her kid going off hunting like her father."

"You think Mom would've been?"

There was a change in the air when he said that, everything going still for a moment. When Dean took a breath he did it silently, not wanting to get in the middle of this one.

"I think your mother knows we're doing this for her," said John finally, "and I think your girlfriend does too."

Sam nodded then, and looked away. "Yes, sir," he said, turning the page of his book. Dean got up then, crossed to his own things and pulled something out of them.

"Here," he said to his father, handing the journal back to him. "I think you're going to be needing this."

John looked at the book like he hardly remembered what it was, then ran a hand lovingly over the cover and accepted it. "Thanks, Dean," he said, setting it in his lap. "Now tell me what you boys have been up to."

It was a safe topic, a necessary topic, and Dean was happy to elaborate while Sam continued with their father's research. He'd just gotten to their arrival in New York City when the sky began to darken and a flash of lightning brightened their room, and they all knew that things had begun once again.

: : :

Things weren't like they used to be, with the three of them together, which as far as Dean was concerned was a good thing. Much as he'd missed his little brother like he'd miss a part of his own self that was lost, the weeks and months and maybe years leading to Sam's decision to leave the fold had been punctuated with fights of ever-increasing volume and intensity.

Instead it was quiet, Sam reading a volume that his father had pressed into his hands, John in and out of the hotel room as one by one he gathered all the things on some arcane list he held, and Dean systematically going through ever weapon he carried with him, making sure each was in perfect working order. It had been like this for a day already, and he could only hope that the peace would hold.

The dream of finding their father again had not included an afterward, wherein they all learned to live in each other's space once again.

When every gun was cleaned, every knife sharpened, every propellant device tightened, and every flask stoppered, Dean turned his attention to Jessica's legacy.

He'd been painstakingly putting every piece in its place, mending every part that had been damaged or warped in the fire, and just days before they reached San Francisco, by the light of a fire in the mountains, he'd realized the missing piece that was meant to go in the center of the device was a series of lenses set at very particular angles. Now that they were in San Francisco, cooling their heels while they came up with a plan, it was easy to acquire what he needed, but even once they were in place Dean still wasn't sure what he had in hand.

It was almost certainly a weapon - or rather, something that _could_ be used as a weapon, though from what he knew of Jess he wondered if she had other uses in mind. Dean was so intimately familiar with each and every piece of it now he did have some idea how it was meant to operate, on a scientific level. On a practical level, even a child could have figured it out: the button on the handle was meant to be pushed, something that likely oughtn't be tested in a hotel room.

He ended up returning it to its place in his automobile with everything else he'd just worked on, to be tested another time, in another place, when they had time for such things again.

"All right, I need to show you boys some things," said John, coming in mid-afternoon with another paper-wrapped bundle. Obviously not the things in the bundle, however; those he stashed away with the others without so much as a word about it.

"What kind of things," said Dean, wiping gun oil off his hands with an old rag, something he thought might once have been one of his good shirts.

"It's from a book called the Lesser Key of Solomon--"

"If you're talking about how to make a devil's trap, we already know," interrupted Dean. "We tried one on that demon bitch back in New York but she didn't bite."

"Well then," he said, "I guess you boys have been busy while I've been gone."

"Did we have any choice?" said Sam, closing the book he was holding. "There's no reference here to a demon with yellow eyes."

"He's real, boys, I've seen him. I've seen what he can do."

"So have we," said Sam, looking for all the world like he wished he'd closed the book harder. Maybe next he was going to find a few doors to slam, just to get his point across. "But there's nothing here that's going to help us figure out his weaknesses."

"Then we'll proceed on the assumption they're the same as any other demon," said John. Dean didn't like the sound of 'assume', but he didn't have any better ideas so he said nothing. "If we want this to happen on our own terms, we need to choose a place for him to find us. Somewhere out of the way."

They didn't have to find somewhere, though. Sam and Dean had known all along where this was going to happen.

"The old airship terminal at the edge of town," said Sam after a moment. "They abandoned it as a terminal after the hydrogen explosion of ninety-nine, but the hanger's still there."

"That's perfect," said John. "Good thinking, Sam."

Dean looked up, casual as could be, to meet Sam's eyes. Sam gave his head a sharp, short shake, but Dean just nodded in quiet argument. If there was ever a time to talk about this, it was _now_ , before they met this demon, and not in the aftermath. And Sam knew it as well as Dean did, even if he kept his lips pressed together for a few long moments before speaking.

"I didn't think of it, Dad," he said finally. "I know we're supposed to go there."

"You _know_ we're supposed to go there?" said John. "Did those demons tell you something back in New York?"

"No," said Sam, still looking profoundly reluctant. "I get visions sometimes."

"You get visions?" said John, looking from one son to the other as though the answer might be found in the space between them. "Was anyone ever planning on telling me this?"

"We just did," said Dean, but something told him his father wasn't entirely surprised by this news. "But I think Bobby might've beaten us to it."

"Bobby Singer never said a word to me about _this_ ," he said. "How long has this been going on?"

"Since right after you disappeared," said Dean, but Sam was shaking his head.

"No, from before you came to get me, Dean," said Sam quietly. "The first time I saw something was before you came to get me. I just didn't know it at the time. I thought it was just a nightmare."

John still looked like he was processing the information, slotting it in somewhere in the journal inside his head.

Dean had an idea just what it was Sam had seen, and what had been haunting him all these months, but he didn't say it aloud and he didn't ask. Another thing for another time, when they were at their leisure to deal with it.

"So how are we going to get them to fight on our terms?" said Dean, to prevent his father from going down that road either, or any road that led to more discussion of Sam's visions.

"You boys leave that to me," said John, never taking his eyes off Sam. "I have everything I need. We go tonight. Just make sure that trap is good and set."

"Yes, sir," said Dean, and fell back into the role he knew so well.

: : :

They were good boys, John Winchester's boys. Sometimes a handful, but if there was anyone in the whole world he wanted at his back, it wasn't any of the seasoned hunters or soldiers he'd met on the road but his own flesh and blood. Both of them.

The hangar was deserted, Easter week keeping families at home. Hell, this old hangar was probably deserted most of the time anyway, the damaged and deflated airship at the center of it covered in a layer of dust, the old repair automatons motionless, like a dozen dead soldiers propped up against the wall.

Lots of places for nasty things to crawl out from and hide, but it was big and solid and, more importantly, far from prying eyes and bystanders. It was about the best they could ask for, and the moment they stepped inside John got his boys setting things up as much as they could.

The devil's trap was painted not chalked, no taking any chances there, and hidden by an old dustcover on the concrete floor of the hangar. It was as flawless as they could make it, and between him and Dean - mostly Dean, he had to admit - the three of them were armed to the teeth, as ready as they could be for whatever was coming for them.

John knew you couldn't be prepared for everything, but they'd done all they could.

"At least the airship is on the ground this time?" he heard Sam say softly to his brother, and instantly felt another pang of regret for what they'd gone through in Chicago without him.

"We're as ready as we're going to be," said Dean as the night grew later. It had to be nearly midnight, by John's reckoning, though he didn't check his pocket watch to be sure. The time didn't matter.

"Good," said John. "Then stay that way."

And, kneeling on the floor a short distance from the trap, he took the packages from inside his duster, opening each in turn. Setting up for the summoning ritual.

"Dad?"

"I've got this all under control," he said, though control was probably a misnomer. If this worked, he wouldn't be the one in control at all. At least, not until they sprung the trap. "This won't take long."

"Dad, are you _summoning_ him?"

"It was the only way to do this on our terms," he said. Enough with the running and enough with the chasing and enough with the damn _waiting_. John knew who and what this thing was now, and that was enough for John to bring the demon to him. He hoped. Because if this didn't work, the whole plan fell apart.

"Dad, that's crazy," said Sam. "You can't control a demon like this."

"I don't plan to," he said. "All I have to do is get him here."

And he blocked out any further protests as he began the ritual, wincing only as it called for his own blood, an act which, as a hunter, he always hated to perform. It was a level of vulnerability that he wouldn’t go anywhere near if he had any choice in the matter.

There was silence when he finished, complete silence. For a long time.

"I don't think it work--" began Sam, when there was a echoing creak from the back of the hangar, and a rusty door opened to allow a man to step inside. A man like any other man, looking just like what Ava described.

"Together again at last," he said, every footstep echoing in the hollow building. "I was wondering just how long that was going to take."

"Don't move," said Dean, "you son of a bitch."

"Or what, you'll shoot me?" he said, continuing his slow and steady progress forward until he stood about fifteen feet from them.

John was the one to step forward, leaving all the ritual implements where they lay on the floor, their power consumed and their usefulness passed. He wanted his revenge so badly that he _ached_ with it; just one thing was more important.

"What do you want with my son?"

The demon smiled slowly, and blinked his eyes so they finally turned their natural, sickly yellow. As John looked into them he half expected them to start oozing pus as he watched, an outward sign of the infection he was.

"So this is Sam," said the demon, taking another step forward as though that would allow him to see the boy better. John would have shot him where he stood if he thought it would do any good. "It's been a long time, Sammy. I bet you don't remember me."

"I don't need to," said Sam, raising his water-propelling gun, hitched straight to a holy water supply strapped to his back. That, at least, was something they had in abundance. "And I don't want to."

"Kids today, so ungrateful," he said. "A well-mannered child would thank me for the gift I gave him."

"Gift?" said Sam. "What gift?"

But John already knew all too well what the demon was talking about. He'd known for longer than he wanted to admit, to himself or to his boys. His son wasn't an exception to the rule he'd discovered, much as he wished he could have been. His son hadn't escaped this demon's curse.

"Why, your visions, of course," he said. "And all the other abilities with them, but then you haven't figured that out yet, have you?"

"I don't have any other abilities," he said, "But Ava and Max--"

"Oh yes, Max," he said, clucking his tongue. "We all had such high hopes for that boy, but all for naught. Before you, Sam, he was my most promising."

"Where is he?" said Sam. "What happened to him?"

John wasn't interested in what happened to some other man's son, but he wanted to know what might befall his.

"He proved himself... not quite up to the task laid before him," said the demon, "but not to worry, we have other prospects. Including Sam here. Oh, you've developed quite well, haven't you? A few months on the road have put you back in _prime_ fighting shape."

"All the better to defeat you with," said Sam, moving around to the side, beginning to use their slight advantage to circle him. Minus the chatter, everything was still on plan. "It seems to me we outnumber you."

"Oh, you didn't think I'd come without friends, did you?"

He raised a hand, as though summoning a friend to his side, but it wasn't people who emerged from the shadows but eerie, billowing columns of smoke. They'd all made sure they weren't vulnerable to possession - John had made sure, because he knew what he was going to do - but the demons didn't even try. They headed straight for the deactivated automatons by the wall.

"You can't--" said John, but he was wrong. He was so wrong. As his sons had discovered before him, he soon saw that humans weren't the only hosts for these creatures.

The first time John watched the dead eyes of one turn an inky black, he suddenly understood why his elder son had always hated them so much

"That's the spirit, boys," said the yellow-eyed demon as Dean turned to raise a weapon against them. "I'd hate to think I took all the fight out of you. That wouldn't be any fun at all."

"There's only one thing I need to know," said Dean, maintaining his position in their cautious rout even as he focused on the approaching automatons. "Which one of you is that bitch Meg?"

None of them had mouths with which to answer, just stiffly-jointed legs to bring them closer and smoke-black eyes to stare the way.

They were a distraction from the primary goal, but not one that could be ignored. John tried, as he slowly circled the yellow-eyed demon, trying to herd him closer to the trap they'd set, but the automatons drew ever closer and the yellow-eyed demon hardly moved.

"What do you say, Sam?" he said. "Come with us and we'll let your family go free. I think you'll discover just how much you can be appreciated--"

"Shut the hell up," said Dean and finally let loose the first volley, a splash of holy water into his chest that didn't do more than make him blink. John hadn't expected it to and, apparently, neither had Dean. It wasn't an attack, just a warning. "Sam would rather die."

"Oh, I know _he_ would," the demon said, turning those malignant yellow eyes on Dean. "But would he let _you_?"

John knew without having to be told that Dean's sudden and immediate silence and immobility wasn't by choice. But he was an experienced hunter, and he had the patience to carry on. As long as Dean was still breathing, John could see this through. He circled some more, slowly, herding the yellow-eyed demon in the right direction while he still could.

But the demon-possessed automatons arrived first, moving faster than their mechanical parts should have allowed and wielding a strength that was equally enhanced, metal limbs wielded with malice. If John had thought the things were soulless before, now they looked as though they could suck yours out of you with just a look.

"Sam, be sharp!" he said, and started hauling out the arsenal to hit the onslaught. The kind of incendiary weaponry John carried had little effect on their tin and brass frames, and projectiles did nothing but slow them momentarily down, no flesh and blood bodies to tear apart. Their best weapons were still holy water and holy words, which both he and Sam flung at them with every increasing speed and volume.

What he wanted to do was fire on the damned yellow-eyed demon, but that would be short-term satisfaction against a long-term goal, and John'd had twenty years to learn patience. He was so very nearly where they needed him to be; one angered blast of holy water might've sent him away from as easily as into the trap. Better he think they were thoroughly distracted by his little automaton army, a half-dozen relentless creatures that did pose a very real threat, especially in their current form.

Maybe more of a threat than John had at first realized.

As weapons were emptied one after the other, bullets, arrows, hurtling blades with edges that would've been more effective against flesh than metal, John flung them aside, sending them skittering across the concrete floor. Another day he would have taken more care, but there was only one goal now and it was within their reach.

He ran out before Sam did, left with the dregs of a bladder of holy water and a whole lifetime's worth of determination. He thought about stripping Dean of the weapons he was in no condition to use, knew Dean wouldn't blame him for it, but the yellow-eyed demon was delighting in keeping Dean in his grasp, motionless and forced to watch his father and brother slowly overwhelmed while the demon did nothing but oversee their defeat. He was taking his time, because he knew he was winning.

He didn't think he had anything to be afraid of.

Just a few more feet and they'd have him trapped within the seal, and it might have been miles for all the good it was doing them. John had always feared it would go down this way, but damned if he wasn't going to go down fighting.

Sam's weapon supply dwindled too against the relentless tide. They'd taken out nearly a dozen physical automatons, but without ever managing a complete exorcism - impossible under these conditions - they would just slip through the cracks of the body, a cloud of oily smoke, and take on another one. There wasn't a limitless supply, but they'd chosen this location for its lack of proximity to warm bodies, and that advantage was lost the moment the first automaton opened its black eyes.

And oh, the yellow-eyed demon was amused. "It's easier when the hosts don't fight back," he said, "but I have to say it's not nearly as much fun."

Sam finally dropped his last firearm and reached for the only thing left inside his coat, that blasted sentimental device that Dean had been tinkering with the whole time they'd been in the hotel. If that was the only weapon that remained, then the only real hope they had left was the small amount of holy water John had kept in reserve to get them out.

He just didn't know if his heart could stand them walking away from this one without winning.

Sam took one last breath and pressed the button on the device, and John watched as the small bit of electrical light that the device produced was reflected and magnified and reflected and magnified again until a single beam of intense light was propelled from the device. And he watched as Sam turned from the automatons and in a last ditch effort sent that beam of light right into the yellow-eyed demon's chest.

He ignited almost instantly, both his clothes and the flesh beneath them, sending up a terrible burst of oily smoke and the scent of charred meat. Sam looked vaguely horrified at what he'd done, at what the device was capable of, but the ray had done what nothing else had: released Dean from the demon's grasp and sent the demon stumbling backwards, into the radius of the devil's trap that they had so painstakingly created in the hours before the summoning.

It somehow seemed right, even to John, that after everything Sam's Jessica had her small part in getting him there.

"You son of a bitch," said Dean as soon as he was free, drawing forth a great water-propelling canon and splashing an indecent amount of holy water on his already charred flesh.

It was at that moment the demon realized he was trapped, unable to move past the barrier, his skin still smoldering from the holy water and the astonishing light-emitting weapon.

"Now you're going to tell us everything we want to know, you yellow-eyed bastard, before we send you straight back to hell," said Dean.

Sam, shaking off the horrified shock that had frozen him, lifted the weapon again and turned against the rest of the automaton invaders, igniting them one by one until there was nothing left of them but melted, twisted metal, and nowhere for the demons to go but away as their leader stood snared in the devil's trap.

"I will get him," he said through smoking, cracked lips. "Hell can't hold me. Sam will take his rightful place with us."

"Over my dead body," said John fiercely. He'd see Sam dead before he saw him throw in with these demons, and he wasn't sorry for that.

"If it comes to that," he said, backing up a couple of steps inside the invisible circle and closing his eyes.

It started with a distant rumbling, like the passing of a train. John looked around uncertainly, but barely had time even for that before the floor rocked violently beneath them, sending Sam to his arse and barely leaving John and Dean standing. Then the wall, the roof, and everything within them started rocking and falling.

He started moving as the first cracks began to appear in the floor, shuffling, halting steps away from the demon and the devil's trap, reaching a hand out to try to help Sam to his feet again. The tiny gaps in the cement grew longer and wider until the cement finally shattered, breaching the devil's trap and releasing the demon from his prison.

The broken body crumbled as a rush of black smoke boiled out from his bleeding mouth, straight for the ceiling of the hangar and right through a widening crack.

The shaking didn't stop when he was freed, though. Instead it felt like it was growing more violent, the rumbling getting even louder. Everything around them started toppling to the cracked concrete floor.

"Earthquake!" shouted Sam, tucking the weapon away again safely and scrambling to get away from anything that might fall down on them. Including the ceiling. "Get out!"

They weren't close to the door, but even on Dean's still-weak ankle they were able to race out over the uneven concrete before the ceiling began to crumble and fall, wooden slats still full of nails piercing the deflated airship envelope.

They ran until they stumbled, tripped up by a ground that felt like it was falling out from beneath them, and finally stayed where they landed until the shaking stopped. It felt like forever, yet had likely been no more than a minute from start to finish.

The hangar was in ruins, as was every building within sight.

John suddenly felt lucky that any of them got out alive.

"There are going to be aftershocks," said Sam finally, as they struggled to their feet, still unsteady. "And Dean, your automobile...."

"Jesus, Tessa," said Dean, looking around frantically for her and finally spotting her tilting a little to the side but looking as though she'd been spared the worst. "I can't drive her till I look her over."

"No one's driving anywhere," said John. "Not yet."

They were far enough from the city to be able to see it as a whole, rather than the sum of its parts, and it was there that John's eyes were fixed.

San Francisco was burning, flames warring with sunrise to illuminate the horizon. The city was crumbling right in front of them, another victim of the yellow-eyed demon, and there was not a damn thing to do.

Another day, another disaster, but the Winchester men were still standing.

"So what now?" said Sam. "He got away."

John was silent for a few moments, eyes fixed on the horizon. "I got a letter from Jim Murphy the other day," he said finally, "tells a legend of a gun that can kill anything. It's out there somewhere."

A gun that could kill anything could kill that sonofabitch demon too, not just send him to hell, and that was exactly what John wanted to do before the demon hurt anyone else he loved.

"Come on boys," he said. "We have work to do."

**Author's Note:**

> A huge thank you to my artist, tammylee, who was a huge collaborator on this finished product and somehow managed to surprise me with some additional art pieces on the day of posting! And to Sarah, for being the awesomest, as well as Ruth, Joy, Kara and Leah for betaing, cheerleading and, when I needed it, telling me I wasn't crazy for taking this on. <3 And I really hope I didn't make too many corrections to this story after originally posting it, because this was imported from the original master file.


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